Whenever one argues for something good in the face of a great evil, there is the tedious task of dealing with the obtuse. I say I am for free markets, which means I am necessarily against "intellectual property rights" (IPR) or properly termed copyrights, trade marks and patents.
The obtuse live in a world of false dilemma: no IPR, no possible chance of getting paid for your work. IPR or nothing. (In fact, in most instances the reality is IPR AND nothing.)
I am all for people making as much money as possible off their ideas. I am very much against people leveraging the violence of the state to earn money. As one with a copyright on a book that has sold for ten years, I know how to make the most money off my work, and that is to work it myself. The best way to make the most money off your ideas is to work the ideas yourself.
Another common challenge is "but your book is copyrighted." Correct. If not, Amazon, etc will not buy it from me. If not, I cannot give me book away free on Google, which is the #1 drive for sales at Amazon.com. The copyright does me no good as far as sales, and I actively make the copyright pointless so I may enjoy the best results.
But once the red herring word "property" is inserted into a discussion of copyrights, patents, etc, people go delusional thinking "my property/maximum benefit to me/ anyone else is stealing" (see Patry) and what follows is a downward spiral contrary to free markets.
I am not against people making money on their work, I am against people using the violence of the state to deny others the ability to make money doing their work.
Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.
The obtuse live in a world of false dilemma: no IPR, no possible chance of getting paid for your work. IPR or nothing. (In fact, in most instances the reality is IPR AND nothing.)
I am all for people making as much money as possible off their ideas. I am very much against people leveraging the violence of the state to earn money. As one with a copyright on a book that has sold for ten years, I know how to make the most money off my work, and that is to work it myself. The best way to make the most money off your ideas is to work the ideas yourself.
Another common challenge is "but your book is copyrighted." Correct. If not, Amazon, etc will not buy it from me. If not, I cannot give me book away free on Google, which is the #1 drive for sales at Amazon.com. The copyright does me no good as far as sales, and I actively make the copyright pointless so I may enjoy the best results.
But once the red herring word "property" is inserted into a discussion of copyrights, patents, etc, people go delusional thinking "my property/maximum benefit to me/ anyone else is stealing" (see Patry) and what follows is a downward spiral contrary to free markets.
I am not against people making money on their work, I am against people using the violence of the state to deny others the ability to make money doing their work.
Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.
2 comments:
A problem with IPR is that it sounds so logical and "reasonable" to the lay public, which the patent bar exploits: "Hey, we need patents, because patents = jobs and innovation!" When an unschooled individual thinks superficially about patents (and copyrights), it sounds perfectly reasonable for a lone inventor (...working "alone" is another myth) working diligently to perfect an invention that they alone created and for them to agree to disclose it (... "full disclosure" is another myth) and then sell it exclusively for a period of time. Why shouldn't an inventor working their butt off for years be able to profit off of their own sweat and hard work? After all, if other people could just steal their invention without them doing any of their own work, why bother? But, when one begins to scratch the surface and dig deeper into what is really going on, the problems and fallacy of IPR readily reveals itself (as shown by Boldrin and Levins' book: Against Intellectual Monopoly). The rationale for IPR appeals to the intellectually lazy, corrupt and uneducated.
Another point: the fact that the US onstitution mentions IPR implies "legitimacy" for the existence the IPR regime (Article I, Section 8, Clause 8):
http://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/articles/1/essays/46/patent-and-copyright-clause
Read the clause very carefully. What meaning did the writers of the Constitution intend? Is it clear? I believe the meaning and scope of this clause has been expanded well beyond anything that the framers intended. Some framers were known to view state-sanctioned monopolies as problematic. Also, copyright duration keeps getting extended (What happened to "limited times"?).
...If I just had a nickel for every time some patent lawyer argued: "It's in the Constitution!, to get patents is a Constitutional right!, patents are natural rights!, they are property!" Sigh.
We will be stuck with IPR, at least in the U.S., for a very long time unfortunately I think. How bad will it get before serious reforms are made?
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