Intellectual Property is not property

Intellectual Property and patent laws are shams that serve only to stifle creation and make the rich richer.

Firstly, how has property been defined throughout human history? Property has been defined as something tangible that can belong to one person or another but not both at once. Property cannot be in two places at once. IP laws basically make ideas and thoughts property.

From Intellectual Property Myths: "Physical property rights are derived from the basic fact that a physical object can't be in two places at once. In order to keep people from squabbling over material objects, we use a system of rights to say "who gets what". Information, however, differs from physical property in a number of ways, one of which being that it can be in many places at the same time. Let's say that Fred gives Barney an apple; after this, Fred no longer has the apple. If, on the other hand, Fred tells Barney about the apple, Fred still knows about the apple. Fred gave the information to Barney, but Fred still has it! Clearly, then, there is no need for Fred and Barney to squabble over who "owns" the information about the apple: to do such would be to try to treat information like an object, an idea which is clearly flawed."

It doesn't make any sense, thoughts and information only belong to someone as long as they keep it in their head. When they tell other people about it, it becomes everyones.

Not only that, patent laws actually end up killing people.

People say that artists will make less money on their music and movies if IP laws are abolished. Well, yes they're right. They should have to sell a tangible product like everyone else, and if they can't figure out a way to stay in business without forcing information to be illegal then they should go under.

It's a losing battle the entertainment industry is fighting, internet piracy is only increasing and getting harder to track. It's time to get rid of IP and patent laws once and for all.

 

Surely someone must have an opinion on this?

 

i'd say something, but neither you or the mods would lke it.

 

IP has its proper role, but the terms should be radically shortened. The world moves faster now than it did in ages past, and the terms of intellectual property ought to become shorter as a result. Copyright in software is particularly troublesome.

 

I completely agree with this.

Is time to restablish something the copyleft. Better, totally agreed let's get rid of IP and patent laws. Only must be recognized the authory of something, and in part.

With that you're proposing we would have something that the right is so demanding:

- Free market.

 

I disagree MOSTLY.

The patent and copyright system, at least in the US, is ridiculously broken and IS stifling innovation as companies prefer to higher a team of lawyers as opposed to hiring a team of researchers.

That doesn't mean that the whole idea of IP is void but the system does need fixing in a big way.

 

Why should anyone have rights to an idea if they tell people about and then sell it? You can't control an idea once people know about it. Any attempt to is coercive and violates people's rights.

 

This is not a surprising attitude from leftists who own nothing, think nothing, create nothing, do not know the questions, have no answeres, and snivel about everything.

 

Way to prove your superiority. Have anything of substance to say or are you just going to attack my character?

 

I did prove it didn't I. And it took no effort.

Attack your character. Thin skinned? Much.

I simply commented on leftist loserims's propensity for attacking all things that make this country great. Ideas and creating and the individual will to make it happen.

 

So that's a no then? Spout your partisan bull(*)(*)(*)(*) somewhere else, if you want to discuss the issue of intellectual property then go right ahead. With posts like this, I'm surprised you haven't been banned yet.

 

There was a very amusing SF book written some years ago where China completely destroys the USA and its economy by dropping out of all international conventions on intellectual property rights and then making all the U.S. entertainment, patents and proprietory data available for free download over the internet.

This was just fiction, but it does point out how important intellectual property rights really are. The modern world would find it difficult to exist without them and there is an increasing tension between the rights owners and the rights pirates in our global village.

 

Why are they important? A fiction book doesn't prove that they're important.

 

Ah shucks...you are just mad because I am right.

It would seem that because someone else is creative enough to patten a new idea and profit from it, then they are a bad person, because you are not and never will because you are hindered by Marxist thought and have bought into his incompetent theory of a promised utopic equality that is always a fail everywhre everytime. And it would seem that you are also angry that entering into a contract is somehow a social degeneration.

 

People have a right to private ownership of property that is the true source of equality and wealth.

 

I was not aware that artists and authors are affected at all by patent or Intellectual Property laws. I thought the issue there was copyright where the creator of the piece is protected.

I agree though that the music and film industries are fighting a losing battle. The copyright laws as they stand date back to the invention of the printing press and are, of course, outdated. The music industry in particular is in trouble as they have tried to fight the internet itself. Too late they have embraced the idea of selling their music on line instead of actual hard copies.

The bootlegging of music has become a tide that the music industry is trying to hold back, with a rake. Times have changed and no longer will people be able to continue to get rich off the work of the artist. And the artists are going to have to return to the day when they had to actually had to perform the work in order to make money.

 

Valid intellectual discussion regarding the nature of property is now trolling? I guess anything that might strain your brain must be ridiculed out of fear and spite.

 

It's not a leftist or rightist issue, that's just ridiculous partisan hyperbole meant to stifle discussion. Ideas and creations have made this country great but you fall into the typical post hoc fallacy and attack the OP for your own intellectual dishonesty. Now, answer me this, if you are a thinking, right wing person as you alleged yourself to be, and not the stuck-inside-the-box dimwit that your last post makes you appear to be: Name one invention or creation or idea came about because of intellectual property laws.

 

Copyright laws are part of the body of laws we refer to as intellectual property laws.

 

Yeah, but ideas aren't property. If an idea can be in a million places at once, how can it belong to any one person?

Also, where did you get the idea that I'm a marxist? I'm an anarchist that advocates free markets. I abhor communism.

 

Yes, exactly. The natural right of property ownership is inherent. However, intellectual property shares none of the characteristics of property.

As the OP points out, an idea cannot be owned in the sense that something you produced with materials is owned. If you record a song and play it to me, I now have that song in my head. If I write it down and record it again, what property have you lost? Do you not still have your original recording and can play it, share it, perform, it, etc.

 

He does that to anyone he disagrees with. You are correct, this is a natural rights issue. Collectivism makes everything owned by the state, including ideas which it makes into property. Intellectual property can only exist by collectivism because the laws that define it are only possible through the state.

 

I completely agree with you, this post sums up pretty nicely why IP is such a flawed concept.

 

It is property in the sense that is created by intellect of the creator. If others benefit from it then that creative effort is entitled to have compensation because it is a form of industrious endeavor in the same way that the production of a Ford is the creation of an idea manifested in a real tangible product that is enjoyed by the purchaser. If you reproduce someone else's product and have made it better then you have a right to profit form it, but you still have to give credit to the originator.

 

I've developed things. And I've written articles. All that is accesible for everybody. So don't say nonsense.