Those who are in the public eye and need to follow the letter of the law (librarians, teachers) would be severely limited in their work by restrictive legislation. Those doing more private things (sending music & clips to friends, or even pirates) would still do what they do.

On the flip side though, it would give police or those with more political power far too much leverage against you. A story I heard once was about the old soviet union – where if you did something the Party didn’t like but wasn’t explicitly illegal on the books, they would just charge you with the crime of dealing in black market goods. Since the state was so poor at providing the necessities of life, it was a practical certainty that viirtually everyone had black market dealings.

Will ‘copyright violations’ be our black market? Is that a road we want to pursue, in a vain attempt to preserve outdated business models?