The problematic application of economic discourse to the creation and transfer of information

In Citizen's United v. FEC (2010) and Sorrell v. IMS Health, Inc. (2011), the Supreme Court of the United States passed down a pair of opinions which clearly show the weaknesses of economic discourse as applied to the creation and transfer of information, itself defined as speech the court's opinion in Bartnicki v. Vopper (2001). Foucoult described economic discourse in his Archaeology of Knowledge (1972) as being particularly exclusive, both in terms of other discourse as well as to the potential participants in the discourse. This paper argues for the need to incorporate alternate modes of discourse that would provide a more complete understanding of the practical, social, ethical and legal parameters surrounding information's creation and transfer.