What do jazz, gene sequences, and the World Wide Web have in common? They all reveal what’s at stake when our cultural commons shrinks. In this episode, James Boyle, author of The Public Domain, joins Molly Shaffer Van Houweling to explore why the public domain is essential for creativity, innovation, and a healthy information ecosystem. From surprising case studies to the “range wars” of the digital age, Boyle explains how expanding intellectual property rights can stifle culture—and what it will take to protect the commons we all depend on.

This conversation was recorded on 12/18/2025. Watch the full video recording at: https://archive.org/details/the-public-domain

Check out all of the Future Knowledge episodes at https://archive.org/details/future-knowledge

For this special holiday episode, we’re celebrating the Internet Archive’s milestone of 1 trillion web pages archived with something a little different: live music created just for the occasion.

Join us for conversations with composer Erika Oba, composer Sam Reider, and cellist Kathryn Bates of the Del Sol Quartet, recorded around The Vast Blue We, the concert held at the Internet Archive to honor our shared digital memory. Two new commissions premiered that night: Oba’s “Blue Lights” and Reider’s “Quartet for a Trillion,” both written to capture the wonder and scale of the open web—and brought to life by Del Sol Quartet. Oba later reconfigured “Blue Lights” for a solo performance during The Web We’ve Built celebration.

In this episode, you’ll hear brief conversations with the artists about their creative process, followed by recordings from the performance itself. A short, reflective holiday release that celebrates collaboration, imagination, and what we can build together.

Check out all of the Future Knowledge episodes at https://archive.org/details/future-knowledge

What made the early web so thrilling, and how do we reclaim that spirit today? In this special episode, recorded at Georgetown University’s historic Riggs Library, leaders who helped build the internet and those fighting for its future come together to chart a path forward.

Featuring Brewster Kahle (Internet Archive), Vint Cerf (Google), Cindy Cohn (EFF), and Jon Stokes (Ars Technica), and moderated by Luke Hogg of the Foundation for American Innovation, this conversation looks back at the web’s origins to imagine what a truly open, innovative, and empowering internet could still become.

This conversation was recorded on 10/27/2025. Watch the full video recording at: https://archive.org/details/wayback-to-the-future-celebrating-the-open-web

Check out all of the Future Knowledge episodes at https://archive.org/details/future-knowledge