I hope you were able to attend our Copyright Alliance Exponential Thursday in the House Cannon Caucus Room. We blogged live from the event in summary format, but I wanted to share some impressions of the day.

About 400 copyright holders, members of the media, and policy
makers and staff are gathered here on Capitol Hill for the first annual
Copyright Alliance Exponential, an event designed to promote the idea that
copyright is an engine for creativity, jobs and growth.

BMI’s booth is a crowd favorite, with songwriters Isaac
Hayes, David Porter and Chuck Brown.

John Conyers, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee,
announced plans to introduce a bi-partisan bill in coming weeks that seeks to
make sure copyright enforcements measures throughout the federal government are
working effectively.

Stuart Taylor, Jr., is the co-author with K.C. Johnson of "Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case." He will be a featured speaker at the October 11th Copyright Alliance EXPOnential, and he was kind enough to agree to an interview with the Copyright Alliance regarding his craft as a creator.

I had the good fortune of discussing the Copyright Alliance yesterday with the Administrators of Gospel Music Conference held in Nashville. About 80 copyright administors of various publishers of faith music were in attendance. These publishers were from all over, from Oregon to Illinois, from Missouri to Alabama, from Texas to Ohio, from California to Tennessee, from the United Kingdom to Australia.

A new report by economist Stephen Siwek and the
Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI), reveals that theft of
copyright-protected products, including motion pictures, video games, sound
recordings and business and entertainment software, has cost the U.S. $58
billion in annual economic output, 373,375 jobs, $16.3 billion in lost wages
annually and $2.6 billion in tax revenue annually.

Stephen
Siwek, a principal at Economists Incorporated in Washington, DC,
answered the following questions posed by the Copyright Alliance shortly after
his study was released Oct. 3.