So basically what you’re saying is that not only do you have completely arbitrary notions on what the limits to ownership of property are, you have completely arbitrary, senseless requirements for what qualifies as ownership…and apparently of what constitutes property in the first place.
The “owner” of the land decides, if he feels, that someone (for example air plane company, mining company or space company) violates his property’s physical integrity. It must be visible and proven. It can not be imaginary violation, just for the sake of excluding competitors, what happens with IP. It can be air polution, noise levels, something, that can damage the land, property or the person himself.
Hence, I do not believe in the real ownership of the land per se. But the reasons are quite different from that of IP. I see homesteading as the rent from the mother Earth, speaking poetically. But whatever.
Here’s another piece from just a few days ago that directly addresses these same tired arguments we’re hearing from the OP:
Then how do you define homesteading without requiring to consider the value of labor? So if I worked for years 10 hours a day to cultivate some land, and the other chap doing absolutely nothing just declared the land his, he might win the case in court? I don’t think so.
Homesteading = first come, first serve.
As to which an arbitrator might choose, that comes down to norms and community standards. You’re still expecting law to be an objective standard, despite having been informed numerous times that it is influenced by many factors and is quite fluid.
I accept Stephen Kinsella’s argument that you can’t really own non-scarce resources, and that letting government grant such an artificial monopoly limits everyone else’s ability to use their own real scarce properties as they see fit. Thus being a form of aggression.
I love Rothbard as much as the next Anarcho-Capitalist, but I think he’s wrong on the intellectual property.
value is what other people put in it (subjectively). I can take a shit for 2 hours, but does my excrements have value? I doubt it…
Imagine a scenario where I purchase a plot of land, or discover a virgin plot of land, and hire you to build a shopping mall over the next few years. After its built, you and the other workers decide to claim ownership by virtue of laboring on the land, while all I did was buy the plot or be the first person to stake a claim on it.
Do you see why this might be a problem? In order to rule in favor of you, the judge would have to ignore our labor contract and in doing so, send this signal: If you are the first, If you put your money on the line, if you protect yourself with a contract, we will rule against you. This sort of legal system is incompatible with property and ultimately incompatible with capitalism.
I just realized there are other ways to interpret you question as well. So maybe I claim a plot of land, and shortly after you find it and build upon it unaware that I already made a claim on it. The first few times that these conflicts arise will ultimately bring about social conventions that signal to individuals when it is ok to build on seemingly virgin land. You might win this case and I will learn to better mark my claims (fences and signs) or register my claims with title companies (this is already the norm so I don’t see why all of a sudden people would cease this practice). Likewise, if I won the case you would quickly learn to check with title companies or look for sign posts before investing in a plot of land.
Your first scenario is irrelevant, because I talked about unowned land.
Regarding initial ownership: you can’t claim ownership of a land simply by fencing it. Other people may already use the land, either just for a walk, or for other uses, economic or otherwise. All of these people should receive pieces of ownership. The courts will decide how big will the share be. However labor will definitely be taken into account. If person A just walks through the land, and person B cultivated and irrigated the land, obviously person B will receive a larger share of ownership.
I CAN claim ownership of land by simply fencing it in and people may or may not accept my title claim. What you are saying is that I SHOULDN"T or that I OUGHT NOT be allowed to claim ownership of land by simply fencing it in. The difference is really really important.
You really lost me here. I’m not sure I understand what a share of ownership is, but I’m going to assume it means owning a share of property. Can you explain to me why walking around a plot of land is sufficient to claim ownership while building a fence isn’t (don’t you have to walk around a plot of land to build a fence anyway)?
Are you treating ownership as a legal concept like I am? I think you are because you talk about the courts granting title (I think you are at least). So now you would have to explain why courts would take an inconsistent, ad hoc, communal approach to property when the established legal and cultural norms lean towards Lockean homesteading and private property. Plus, if there is competition in law, you would have to show that your approach would outcompete everyone elses.
You cannot be that dense. How in the hell would you consider someone who shows up 10 years after you do to have a better claim on the land than you? You were there 10 years before he was. You don’t have ownership based on how much labor you put out. That’s the most idiotic thing I’ve ever heard. The point is you were there first. End of story.
But you labored for 2 whole HOURS!!! Certainly that has value!!!
Valuable or not, it’d hard to argue that it wasn’t yours.
The problem with fencing or the “first come first serve” basis is that it is extremely easy to claim ownership. So the first person who would go to the moon could claim ownership of the moon. But why stop here? Why do you even have to go to the land to claim it yours, you can just declare it and that’s it. So the first person who declared Mars to be his would be the just owner. Obviously this makes no sense. In the same way just by arriving first to the land doesn’t make sense. Its just too easy and arbitrary to acquire ownership this way. Besides if you favor the “first come first serve” principle, then you still value labor, after all you don’t give ownership to the first person who declared the land to be his, but only to the person who labored to get there. I value labor more than you. I believe it is not enough just to arrive to the place, you need to do something more, I’m not sure what should it be, but in order to acquire the right to exclude other people from a big piece of land, you’ll need to do something substantial.
Does a sole declaration of ownership mean de facto ownership? Sometimes. But usually its backed up by a powerful state. Like I’ve said, I’m not sure what you think ownership is, but I’m describing it as the legally recognized sole controller of property.
How much value you or I place upon labor in the act of homesteading has no effect upon what would be most likely. I personally think it is insufficient to say “I own the Moon” and then recieve legal title. I personally think it is insufficient to land on one spot of the moon and claim ownership of the whole moon. But its sooo unlikely that those claims would be legally recognized (sans state) that I see no reason to adress the issue. This doesn’t just go for the moon btw. No one is going to accept wild claims of ownership over the grand canyon or the atlantic ocean.
What you believe will have little effect over how things will be. Even if you ran a title company, you would not be able to compete against firms which used less strict criteria for granting title. If I wanted to build a mall on a lot, and acme title co. said “We will protect your claim if you put a fence around the lot and a sign that says when you will start construction” while Eugene’s title co. said “Until the mall is x% completed, the lot is not legally in your name” who do you think I am going to go to?
Regarding exclusion: A land developer is unlikely to hold pieces of unused land for too long. He is either going to build on it or sell it. I think sometimes people think that large firms are going to sweep up huge tracts of land and just sit on them; just because they could doesn’t mean they would. It would cost a fortune to survery that much land so that a title could be registered, then the costs of excluding others, would mean that they would be losing money on unused land. Any profit seeking firm would either build on it, or sell it, but not hold it.
yeah, and would have to clean it myself 
You can’t. For the same reason Columbus couldn’t claim ownership of America’s continent. One can only claim ownership of what he uses (previously unused). Fencing is only a mark of a claim but I personally doubt that it could be considered legitimate ownership (fencing 100 square miles of the Moon, for example). Homesteading is problematic concept, that’s why I am looking at it skeptically, but then again, there is no other better theory..
Has anyone else noticed this thread about “arguments in favor of IP” has turned into one about the details of homesteading? I guess it’s a lot easier to argue when you focus on things other than your baseless argument.
Homesteading is wrong, ergo IP is correct? 
To return to the IP.
IP is important, though patents are seriously overused. Actually I would prefer not to have patents at all. If two people have made the same invention both should be able to sell and make money out of it. With patents only one of them can. This is unfair.
Copyrights are a must though. A person has a right to information he produced, information that wouldn’t exist without him. So if J.K Rowling wrote a Harry Potter book she is the owner of the content of this book. Without her this book wouldn’t exist so she does not deprive anyone of anything when she retains complete control of the information she produced.
In the future physical property will probably become trivial, and the only thing valuable will be intellectual property. Without copyrights the world will resort to socialism in which the most intelligent and capable people will be utilized in jobs that do not require this level of talent and intelligence. Most valuable work will be done either for free or subsidized by donations. Incentives will be a lot smaller. Progress will be seriously hindered just as it was hindered in the Soviet Union because of inefficient allocation of resources and weak incentives.