I thought that the main argument about this essay was the controversy between what is considered “piracy” and “property.” The author was trying to send a message that sometimes common sense is all you need to settle a dispute. For example the argument about who owned the airspace above someone’s property can be solved with common sense. As Justice Douglas said, “Common sense revolts the idea.” It is pretty obvious that people should be allowed to use the airspace to travel. Also the author was saying that people with more money and power are going to be able to control the culture. RCA was a perfect example of how someone can control the culture. Edwin Armstrong had invented FM radio in a time when people thought that that would never be invented. But he was never able to expand his idea because RCA was doing everything in their power to stop him because they were controlling the whole radio industry with AM radio.
I was a little confused about the idea that old laws and ideas need to move out of the way for new ones because I thought that some old laws and ideas were actually better than some of the newer ones. It seemed like the author was saying that all the older stuff needs to make room for newer stuff and I didn’t fully agree with that.
This left me wondering how people do not stand up to the big power people and try and fight back and make their product work. Was it because they didn’t have enough money? Or were they scared?
