Lawrence Lessig

Harvard Law Professor, 2016 Presidential Candidate & the Internet’s Most Celebrated Lawyer

Lawrence Lessig

Harvard Law Professor, 2016 Presidential Candidate & the Internet’s Most Celebrated Lawyer

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Biography

One of the most inspiring and visionary thought leaders of the digital age, Lawrence Lessig occupies a unique place at the intersection of transformative ideas, citizen activism and the future of the law, digital technologies, and democracy itself. His signature rapid-fire presentation style, known as the “Lessig Method” uses dynamic typography and thought-provoking visuals to seize attention and deeply inform.

A Harvard Law professor and New York Times bestselling author, Lessig first became known for developing the very foundations of internet law, allowing the sharing of copyrighted content. He has since taken on issues at the core of our system of government, particularly the impact of money on politics. His 2015 effort to enter the presidential campaign was a crusade for campaign finance reform with a clarion call to “fix democracy first.” Throughout his career, Lessig’s farseeing ideas and efforts have drawn support from some of America’s most important business and political leaders and garnered numerous honors and awards. He is one of Scientific American’s Top 50 Visionaries and was named to Fastcase 50 “honoring the law’s smartest, most courageous innovators, techies, visionaries and leaders.” In his latest venture, Lessig is lending his expertise to build the political framework for Seed, a new multiplayer online game in which characters populating a new planet collectively decide how they want to govern themselves.

A popular speaker on the coveted TED main stage, each of his three TED talks have more than one million views online. Known for his compelling, personal and completely non-partisan content, Lessig’s presentations leave audiences informed, awakened, and with a heightened understanding of any topic.

Speaker Videos

TEDTalk: We the People, and the Republic We Must Reclaim

TEDTalk: The Unstoppable Walk to Political Reform

TEDTalk: Law That Chokes Creativity

Science & the Data Revolution

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Speech Topics

What AI is doing to America’s Democracy — and Democracy

In this lecture, Professor Lessig will discuss the impact of AI on the 2024 American election, and the implications that will have for democracy in the future. AI will force us to consider a next stage in democracy. Lessig will sketch the outlines of that next stage.

On Why Social Media Is Killing Democracy

In this talk, Lessig — named the “Elvis of cyberlaw” by Wired Magazine — describes just how social media today weakens democracy. Drawing on research examining digital addiction and the nature of ad-driven economies, he unpacks the challenge that we face as a democracy presented by technologies that weaken our capacity to decide. Lessig is no luddite. But he insists we must recognize the bad as well as the good, and must as a society find ways to avoid the poison social media can inject into democracy culture — if democracy is to survive.

Wargaming 2024

In this talk, based on his book (with Matthew Seligman), HOW TO STEAL A PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, Lessig discusses the threats we might expect in the 2024 election, as well as reflects on the nature of the challenges created by our unique (and increasingly troubled) Electoral College system. He identifies the risks we should track, and what reforms we might see both before and after this election cycle.

Suing the Times

This talk is grounded in a lawsuit Lessig was driven to bring against the New York Times for "clickbait defamation," but reflects more generally on how the engagement business model for social media has radically changed modern American media and its political culture. If our poisoned politics is the byproduct of a Silicon Valley business model, how can we repair it?

Code at 25

Twenty-five years ago, Lessig published CODE AND OTHER LAWS OF CYBERSPACE, which framed the slogan, "code is law," and grounded a critical approach to Internet regulation. In this talk, Lessig reflects on what we've learned about this understanding of the Internet, and the future of regulation.

How SuperPACs Will Die

Percolating up from the state of Maine is a challenge to the conventional wisdom about SuperPACs: In this talk, Lessig argues, contrary to the view of most, that this United States Supreme Court will uphold limits on contributions to independent political action committees (SuperPACs). When it does, that change will trigger a new movement to reform the influence of money in politics, which will give America the chance to restore at least some confidence in its government.

Testimonials

"It was a great pleasure to welcome you as [our] speaker. Your keynote was very positively assessed by our participants in their evaluation forms. I would like to express my sincere thanks for your contribution. We hope to welcome you again at another event in the future."

- Program Director, ZEIT-Stiftung