The issue isn’t really one of whether one owns the ideas within his head. The issue is whether he may own the contents of someone else’s head (or paper, hard disk, or other information storage media.) As long as the originator of an idea keeps it within his own head, the point is pretty much moot. Once he disseminates it to others, though, it ceases to be just within his own head. Does he have the right to use force to prevent or punish the use of information held in the heads of others?
Non-sequitur. Buying and selling information isn’t the same as punishing those who freely use information.
Hmmm, IP laws, perhaps.
So by your standard, slavery is absolutely fine. What can and cannot be property is definable. Luckily, the market DIDN’T define ideas as property, government did, and forced it upon the public.
Some arbitrary rule like… no rule? Even more ridiculous is this collective market view you’ve espoused that still isn’t possible. Unlike real property, Its impossible to control ideas (in a free environment).
If you are buying information from me why do I not have the right through contract to restrict how you use that information?
You mean that even though you have the information already you are buying it because of IP law, that doesn’t make sense. If you have the information already why bother acquiring it again at cost?
People think that ideas in their head belong to them. That does not require government mandate. You trying to mandate that information is not property is no different than the government trying to mandate something. The market has defined information as property and treats it as such. In the business world lots of information is bought and sold and most of which has no government protection as patentable or copyrighted. Contrary to the Austrian collectivist belief that everybody has all knowledge floating around in their head the real world does not operate that way.
Just like everything else, information is something that has to be acquired and is something if you don’t have you can acquire it from those that do, and those that do have the information have the right not to share it, can charge for it, and can create contracts that restrict your use of it.
Then the question becomes, is such a contract enforceable? For a contract to be valid and enforceable, there must be some change of title to actual property (according to Rothbard.) I could presumably require someone to agree to a contract stating that if he copies my work he must pay me a certain sum of money before I’ll sell him the book. That’s all well and good, but it isn’t really the same as IP as currently practiced, and it doesn’t require a property right in the ideas themselves.
Eventually, by some means, my novel, or at least some pithy quotes from it, are bound to escape into the public realm, though. Someone not under contract will come across them. Perhaps someone loses his copy of the book or throws it away, and another person finds it. The finder isn’t under contract, and I’d have no right at all to initiate force against him to prevent him from doing whatever he wishes with the words and ideas contained in the book, nor against anyone who obtains the ideas from him in turn. I can’t see that such a contract in a libertarian society would accomplish much more than to slightly delay the escape of information into the public domain.
You’re right, I’m not the owner of the ideas in my head. Ideas aren’t property. I own the storage medium (my head) and the means of transmitting the ideas contained within it (my mouth and/or hands) and possibly auxiliary devices to aid in transmission such as a computer or printer. If an idea originates within my head, I can choose to use those means to disseminate it, or I can choose not to and keep it to myself. That does not follow from any property right in the idea itself, but from my property right in the means of transmission.
With the proper voluntary contract, I may be enjoined not to utilize those means of transmission to disseminate some piece of information, but that contract affects my usage of those means, not of the information itself per se.
Did I say anywhere that the contract would be enforceable against third parties? Let stick to the the contract that requires the buyer not to disseminate the information. That should be not prohibited. If there is no proprety involved how can we create a contract? What is the contract concerning?
If information can not be contracted, how can you say we can have a contract restricting its use?
Just a pointless artifical distinction. You act as if the information is irrelevant to the restriction. Is it that hard to see that the information is the critical element?
Please explain why people would buy information if they already have it, which is what you are suggesting?
If ownership has been fully transferred, then you have absolutely none, further, if ideas can be property then the seller of the idea must clear his memory of any sold ideas or else he is a fraud. We could certainly make a prior agreement as to what I may and may not do with that purchase, but contractual agreements aren’t IP laws in any way.
No. Absolutely wrong. I mean, people must purchase the right to build someone’s patented idea even though it can be seen for free. There isn’t any physical reason why people cannot, only unjust, non-contractual agreed, overbearing laws.
The same false assertion yet again. If you want it to only belong to you - keep it in your head!
Please point out this business world that exists without IP laws, only contractual agreements, or stop referencing to it.
And unlike real property, ideas can only be shared never fully transferred. The fact that contracts are the only ethical way to impose such rules on the matter only proves how ideas aren’t actual property.
My point was that such a contract is not equivalent to IP. The contract does not require information to be ownable as property. I could place a condition upon the sale of my novel, say, “You may not produce physical or electronic duplicates of this work, nor recite it aloud to any other person, or else you forfeit the sum of $10,000 to me.” It does involve a transfer, or potential transfer, of title to tangible property (the $10,000 in this case), so it is a contract and not merely a promise, but it in no way requires that I own the ideas which I’ve contractually forbidden the purchaser to disseminate. I could just as well enter into a contract with someone requiring him to pay me if he dances the hokey-pokey, without implying that I own the hokey-pokey. The contract is contingent upon a particular action, not information as such.
Nonsense. I suggested nothing of the sort. Information being freely usable by anyone who acquires it does not imply that the acquisition is automatic and instantaneous.