] It is as if we had signed an international stupidity
] pact, one that required us to ignore the evidence, to
] hand out new rights without asking for the simplest
] assessment of need. If the stakes were trivial, no one
] would care. But intellectual property (IP) is important.
] These are the ground rules of the information society.
] Mistakes hurt us. They have costs to free speech,
] competition, innovation, and science. Why are we making
] them?

I don't think I could have written a better apraisal of the state of things myself if I tried. This article is chock full of great quotes.

James Boyle: Deconstructing stupidity