Since the dawn of time, technology has constantly outpaced the law – but never quite as fast as in the digital age. Some of the most profitable and popular places on the internet today – from MySpace, to YouTube and beyond – exist in legal limbo. Every day, MySpacers and YouTubers commit millions of arguably unlawful acts: for when they are not posting riveting cellphone footage of the baby or the cat or the milk train passing, they are lip-syncing to the copyrighted songs of hot young starlets, or posting top-selling albums for free. Much of what the digerati do online is probably illegal: since the dawn of internet time, it was ever thus.

But what about the websites that provide a venue for all this new-age lawlessness? That remains a remarkably open question. When America’s digital copyright law was passed a decade ago, no lawmaker could have foreseen the existence of a site where millions of netizens could post homemade videos online (not to mention slicker flicks from famous filmmakers, whose copyright they do not remotely own).