Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines how judicial actors such as plaintiffs, defendants, and judges interact through their strategic communication activities, and how these activities influence the structural environment of copyright law. It explores how the structure of copyright law is reproduced and transformed by the processes in which actors with different resources interact. The book emphasizes the role of communication, as manifested in the interactions of judicial actors, in legal decision making processes. It focuses on how different stakeholders with differing resources use the rules and resources in legal arguments, which influence the structuring of the information environment of the copyright system. Study of the copyright rules and discourses regarding computer software in particular helps to understand the interactions among the actors and institutional rules also because the rules in this area are relatively less-grounded and are still evolving.