Interesting. Do you think its actually a forceful argument? Or can it be weaseled out of through whatever ad hoc “patents last 15 years” logic?
Sieben, yes, if you take IP arguments seriously, your argument makes sense; but of course, the IP advocates, who are confused and/or disingenuous, will find some ad hoc way to weasel out of it.
I wonder if Onar and other IP advocates realize that, in a Galambos style world where all ideas are property, they would barely write one blog post in defense of IP without bankrupting themselves?
On a somewhat unrelated note, I know many here will appreciate this article at Cracked:
“…the publisher is resorting to what experts call FARTS–Forced ARTificial Scarcity. Or they would call it that, if they were as awesome at naming things as I am.”
Onar Åm, thank you for bringing to light the vicious vacuity of the libertarian branch. I have been wobbling from libertarianism to classical liberalism over the past two years, and after reading this thread I know that I will never return.
If all it takes is one article based entirely on fallacies and deliberate misunderstandings of the anti-IP position, then it won’t take much to convert you back. God forbid you actually read something that makes sense.
I wonder if Onar and other IP advocates realize that, in a Galambos style world where all ideas are property, they would barely write one blog post in defense of IP without bankrupting themselves?
Which is precisely why most IP advocates identify that there needs to be a complexity to the idea to claim ownership. However, I have as yet to hear where you can draw an infinitely thin boundary denoting IP on one side and whatever they deem as too simple to be IP on the other.
From what I have gathered, many (most?) IP advocates would claim that simply changing a single word in someone else’s works and claiming it as my own is infringement on their IP. How much then must I alter before it is legitimately my IP? Secondly, why that amount?
What a weak mind.
What BiPolar said, and also what Jeffrey mentioned on his blog post. Where to draw the line of what is an original/complex idea? Where to draw the line of how long a patent should last? As Kinsella pointed out, IP rights are utterly random in their details.
I got less involved in these talks because of this. Unable to cope with the fact that physical property rights and intellectual property rights are incompatible, the pro-IP people take IP to be the supreme of the two. From there on, you don’t have a general rule as to what is or isn’t IP. You have to argue it on a case-by-case basis, and it’s always defended by an endless list of assertions.
Don’t make it personal.
My apologies.
The problem with this argument is that it also argues against private property. (If I own a piece of IP, why can I not do what I want with it, in the same manner I can with “real” property?) If there is no clear owner of property, all the other arguments become subject to similar false principles. (i.e. “since Ford built your car, Ford can tell you exactly how to use it” and so forth) The arguments in favor of IP laws I’ve heard thus far strike me as more fascist than “libertarian”.
I would like to know the answer to this as well.
No worries. The other party was certainly fishing for it.
I don’t like the argument from ad-hoc; real property also suffers from some ad-hocness in the homesteading and abandonment phase, comparably with IP, even if it’s better defined and easier to determine possession and use.
First of all, as I answered in a reply to Jeffrey Tucker the time limitation of intellectual property is to prevent the rise of feudal society:
http://blog.mises.org/14286/can-moral-rights-expire-by-law/comment-page-1/#comment-732344
There are other limitations to intellectual property for similar reasons. Just like there are limitations to what you can use your physical property for (such as making a prison around your neighbors) there are limitations to IP. If IP becomes a prison which quelches the freedom of self-determination of an individual, then it has no moral basis. The same is true for slavery, for instance, which is an excessive kind of physical property right.
Second, I tend to agree that the founders of a proper state are morally entitled to something akin to royalties for a certain period. Just like with ordinary IP this will of course be time-limited in order to prevent a feudal society with taxes. This would give an excellent incentive for private entrepreneurs to buy up land (or to homestead uninabiheted land) and create a proper state there. When the initial period of setting up the state is complete the entrepreneur will benefit for instance from the increase in land value when he sells it at a much higher price to citizens of the new state.
There is nothing ad hoc about being reality oriented. How do you know that something is a violation? Well, there isn’t a divine list of crimes up in heaven. You have to actually investigate the facts and see if they fit the bill, and in what sense. This is hard work and requires engaging reality. People find new ways of violating self-ownership all the time, and to identify these things are not automatic. The same hard work that was required to recognize that using a gun to threaten people is a violation and to set up a fence around someone’s property is a violation, one needs to do hard work to identify the boundaries of IP. The nature of IP doesn’t just reveal itself in a flash of revelation from the gods. It requires thought and observation. That’s not ad hoc. That’s called being part of reality.
Onar Am: “I tend to agree that the founders of a proper state are morally entitled to something akin to royalties for a certain period.”
hahha, he admits my argument is right. hahahahhaha
Oh yes anytime someone disagrees with you they’re clearly disconnected from reality. Because your the arbiter on what is or is not reality?
This is a question you need to ask yourself, and research the origins of property, exchange, and economics in general.
Bottom line, your second paragraph here shows that you have a strong opinion regarding Pro-IP, but are generally how economics applies to concepts which are not scarce. Before you can decide whether IP makes sense or not, you must first understand what property.
- What is property?
- How is it formed?
- Why does man socially employ it?
- On what things does he employ it?
- Where does he not employ it?
Start with praxeology, human action, and work from there.
So we would be serfs, and that would be the moral/ethical thing in his opinion. Well position exposed to it’s fullest. Wow.