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My thoughts on IP and anti-IP tunnel vision

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 7:50 AM | Locked

liberty student:

Then we're just talking past one another.  I'm no socialist of the mind.  You're a minarchist, who agrees there should be IP laws.  IP laws are state granted monopoly privilege, and create artificial scarcity and market distortions.

I don't expect you to give up anything to anyone if you do not want to (profit or altruism).  But if you plan to use state laws to distort the market, and infringe on the abilities of your fellow man to act freely on the capacity of their own minds, then yeah we got a big problem.

LS, I think that we may in fact be talking past each other. If you're willing to concede that by copying a book/software/etc when you had agreed in contract not to do so, you would be

liberty student:
Then I would be violating a contract.  No dispute there.
then I *think* that we have no dispute. It would follow that if you're agreeing that you are able to sign a contract limiting your action in exchange for the use of the goods, that this is a way for the market to enforce copyright, withouthe the coersion of the state. Granted, you say you wouldn't want to sign the contract, or it would be a hassle to buy a book and have to sign all these documents, but if it was the only way to get at most books, wouldnt you? Authors could choose to give away their books for free, or sell them online and hope that people still chose to pay. Or they could choose to sell them through publishing companies that would require these types of contracts. Ditto with software, the author could put the ELA contract on it or give it away free.

Same with inventions, such as my cold fusion example. You keep mentioning my using the state to claim monopoly on the idea. I never suggested such. I have said that if someone came up with it independently, they have as much right to it as I. But if they came into my plant and copied my design (and they couldn't enter the premesis of my plant w/o signing a contract that they wouldnt use anything they saw for their own profit) they are clearly in violation of a contract. So you dont have to agree that copyrightable materials are property. You merely have to agree to the sanctity of contract to limit your action. The market would quickly determine if the ideas were of value, or necessary. The contention Jack and I make are that they are. But we argue to enforce the creator's rights through this measure of contracts, not government coercion. I don't think we have a disconnect on this issue after all, you're merely assuming that we're referencing the state, when we are in fact not. Easy to make that mistake with all the other people on this thread muddling each other's positions :-)

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 8:25 AM | Locked

meambobbo:

in this example, what does the contractor forsake before he is given the ship?  money, then it should be returned.  if he is paying on delivery, simply don't pay.  if the ship is delivered, then both parties would be viewed to benefit, at least at the time they signed the contract.  of course, if the ship got built but money was not delivered, the builder shouldn't simply get his ship back...

and there is obviously a gray line here...if the ship builder failed to produce anything but spent his advance and had no property, justice would compell his future action to repay his debt.  i'm frankfully unsure how to remedy cases of much larger scenarios, such as how one could produce justice should he destroy something beyond his net earning potential.

See this is the problem, there is a gray line. But if the penalty for breach of contract were in the contract, there is no gray line at all.

meambobbo:
Can you take away some portion of my brain that has learned a fair bit about your cold fusion invention?

No, but I can take away, via contract, anything that you ever produce using my invention, assuming you learned it while under my contractual terms.

meambobbo:

It seems at any moment if you did not consent and someone attempted to kill you, they would be claiming ownership of your life, independent if or when any contract was made.

Rothbard addresses these as the immutable properties of life and liberty, which can never be contracted away.  They are superior to freedom of contract, as they are both a requirement.

To be able to pick and choose when you feel like consenting to the terms of a contract is quite a slippery slope. What if I say monetary penalties would destroy my life so I no longer consent to them? What if people could back out of any contract they want because they dont feel like it any more? These issues are addressed in the contract with penalties and early termination clauses, etc.

As for Rothbard, he is wrong. By saying I cannot sign a contract ending my life, he is saying that his ideology owns my life, not me. I can sign contracts to end my life. Think of a terminally ill patient who chooses to die rather than suffer any longer. You're saying that he is not allowed to contract a doctor to help him kill himself? Via that situation, or the one I proposed with the shipbuilder, the subject is allowed to end his life via contract, because to claim he cannot is to claim ownership of his life. To say he changed his mind means we allow people off the hook of their contracts. He should have known the seriousness of the contract when he signed it. Now, I think that monetary penalty and loss of possesion would be sufficient penalties for copyright situations, not loss of life. That is rather extreme, though in the case of cold fusion it may very well be used due to the magnitude of that discovery.

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MacFall replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 8:40 AM | Locked

JParker:

More pathetic than having my ideas robbed from me

Your ideas can only be robbed from you if you keep them to yourself. Once they enter the minds of others, they become their ideas. You propose to give government the power to grant ownership of other people's minds by yourself. That is abominable.

my creations given away for free to all who would want it

Only if you decide not to sell a product.

Competition? You dare to say that blatantly stealing a man's ideas and inventions is competition? I invent marvelous new technology, you rip it off and have the audacity to call that competition?

Oh shit! You mean people might have to compete on the basis of excellence in production and distribution, rather than on the basis of having been the first person to get monopoly privilege from the government? What horrors!

You've created a new god to worship and call it anarchy. You're no different than Marx in this regard, at least to my eyes.

You're hilarious. What I am describing is a free market. What you advocate - a state with the ability to enforce intellectual monopoly - would have to be monstrously powerful. It would need extensive powers of surveillance, to ensure that nobody does business without the permission of the patent bureaucracy. It would need a vast funding mechanism to feed that bureaucracy. It would need the power to go to war against nations that did not enforce their patents. And you call yourself a libertarian? Absurd.

Why would the inventor ever let the invention leave his mind when you are guaranteeing that he will never earn anything from it?

We do not guarantee that he will earn nothing from it. Do  you simply lack the imagination to realize that there are ways of protecting one's invention without patents, or are willfully refusing to acknowledge the possibility?

And yet again, this entire argument is based upon a stateless society, whereby freely entered contract controls copyright. Quit throwing the current state on my argument.

You are the one who is calling upon the state to enforce monopoly. Not I.

From whom would you loot?

Nobody. I am not a looter. I don't believe in doing things like using the government to force everyone in the market to come to me, and suppressing anyone else who might be better than I at what I do. That's what you advocate.

Oh and referencing the wheel, which was invented before written history, is kind of rediculous, seeing how you cannot possibly prove that it was not a closely controlled secret during the inventor's lifetime.

LOL. Oh, that's precious. You can see how a wheel works BY LOOKING AT IT. No reverse engineering required!

By the way since you seem to be unable to come up with a voluntary means of ensuring compensation for innovation on your own, I'll cross post one I posted elsewhere.

[NOTE: this is an expansion of an idea originally by the Tannehills in their book, The Market for Liberty ]

As with many other present functions of government, the insurance industry could take the place of patents. An inventor would buy an "inventor's insurance" policy on his invention, guaranteeing a certain amount of profit within a given period of time. Such an amount would be worked out between insurer and inventor, and would be based upon the projected success of the product on the market over the period of time specified.

The insurer, guided by their preference for not having to indemnify the insurant, would sell the plan/prototype/whatever to the manufacturer whom they believe would be most capable of producing it and in competing with emerging copycat manufacturers.

They would look at the manufacturer's ability to prevent or dissuade reverse engineering, their ability to market, and other things. The manufacter would give the inventor royalties on their sales. Eventually, if the insurer chose wisely, the inventor would recieve the guaranteed amount in royalties, and his policy would "mature". If the insurer chose poorly, they would have to pay the inventor the amount promised at the end of the specified period of time.

A further role of this process would be to guarantee to the manufacturer that the product idea is worth purchasing in the first place, as no potential manufacturer would guarantee anything to an inventor without first seeing proof of the viability of his idea. And it may be that a trusted inventor's insurance agency, having well established their ability to predict the profitability of new ideas, would simply sell the idea to the manufacturer for a portion of the projected income, and just pay the inventor a lump sum up front rather than dealing with the whole policy business.

Of course, the risk to the manufacturer in buying the rights to the idea is another insurable liability, so I don't believe that the business model would simply disappear in any case.

No such process has anything to do with intellectual property (which is a non-concept in the first place). It is simply an insurance policy, having no more to do with an inventor's right to profit than fire insurance has to do with the right of a homeowner not to have their house burn down.

That's just one idea. Given a free market, there is no limit to the possibilities that people might dream up. Certainly, there is a demand for innovation in the market, and innovators want to profit. Those who want what the innovators have to offer will help to ensure that the innovators have an incentive to innovate. There is absolutely no reason to assume that political force would become necessary in that process.

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 9:53 AM | Locked

MacFall:

Your ideas can only be robbed from you if you keep them to yourself. Once they enter the minds of others, they become their ideas. You propose to give government the power to grant ownership of other people's minds by yourself. That is abominable.

 

Strawman. I have stated innumberable times that I have not once said the government would be involved. The solution I proposed was for voluntary contract to be the protection system.

MacFall:
having been the first person to get monopoly privilege from the government?
Strawman #2. See same explanation above
MacFall:
What you advocate - a state with the ability to enforce intellectual monopoly - would have to be monstrously powerful. It would need extensive powers of surveillance, to ensure that nobody does business without the permission of the patent bureaucracy. It would need a vast funding mechanism to feed that bureaucracy. It would need the power to go to war against nations that did not enforce their patents

Strawman # 3. Who are you posing an argument against?

MacFall:
Do  you simply lack the imagination to realize that there are ways of protecting one's invention without patents, or are willfully refusing to acknowledge the possibility?
Didnt I propose the very solution before, via voluntary contract? That's what i've been arguing for since I came back into this thread yesterday.

MacFall:
. I don't believe in doing things like using the government to force everyone in the market to come to me, and suppressing anyone else who might be better than I at what I do. That's what you advocate.

Strawman # 4? 5? who knows. You're clearly having an argument with someone else, as i've never said any of this. If you wont debate my actual proposition (which, along with the one you posed, could work) then why even reply?

In fact, from reading your suggestion, we advocate the exact same thing! We both want the inventor/creator to be able to profit. We both agree that his idea is his, and that he would not release it without something giving him compensation. You're somehow assuming that I've brought the state into this, which I NEVER have. I suggested voluntary contract. You have previously suggested insurance companies. Both could work, I believe. Both accomplish the exact same thing. We have no disagreement, other than you throwing up strawmen claiming I want the state to interfere.

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MacFall replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 10:03 AM | Locked

...Oh.


My sincere apologies, I mistook another poster's argument for your own. It was a strawman in that sense, I was arguing against someone else.

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Maxliberty replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 10:20 AM | Locked

JParker:

meambobbo:

in this example, what does the contractor forsake before he is given the ship?  money, then it should be returned.  if he is paying on delivery, simply don't pay.  if the ship is delivered, then both parties would be viewed to benefit, at least at the time they signed the contract.  of course, if the ship got built but money was not delivered, the builder shouldn't simply get his ship back...

and there is obviously a gray line here...if the ship builder failed to produce anything but spent his advance and had no property, justice would compell his future action to repay his debt.  i'm frankfully unsure how to remedy cases of much larger scenarios, such as how one could produce justice should he destroy something beyond his net earning potential.

See this is the problem, there is a gray line. But if the penalty for breach of contract were in the contract, there is no gray line at all.

meambobbo:
Can you take away some portion of my brain that has learned a fair bit about your cold fusion invention?

No, but I can take away, via contract, anything that you ever produce using my invention, assuming you learned it while under my contractual terms.

meambobbo:

It seems at any moment if you did not consent and someone attempted to kill you, they would be claiming ownership of your life, independent if or when any contract was made.

Rothbard addresses these as the immutable properties of life and liberty, which can never be contracted away.  They are superior to freedom of contract, as they are both a requirement.

To be able to pick and choose when you feel like consenting to the terms of a contract is quite a slippery slope. What if I say monetary penalties would destroy my life so I no longer consent to them? What if people could back out of any contract they want because they dont feel like it any more? These issues are addressed in the contract with penalties and early termination clauses, etc.

As for Rothbard, he is wrong. By saying I cannot sign a contract ending my life, he is saying that his ideology owns my life, not me. I can sign contracts to end my life. Think of a terminally ill patient who chooses to die rather than suffer any longer. You're saying that he is not allowed to contract a doctor to help him kill himself? Via that situation, or the one I proposed with the shipbuilder, the subject is allowed to end his life via contract, because to claim he cannot is to claim ownership of his life. To say he changed his mind means we allow people off the hook of their contracts. He should have known the seriousness of the contract when he signed it. Now, I think that monetary penalty and loss of possesion would be sufficient penalties for copyright situations, not loss of life. That is rather extreme, though in the case of cold fusion it may very well be used due to the magnitude of that discovery.

Kudos to you JP and to Jack Skylark you guys have absolutely dismantled the anti-ip crowd clinging desperately to their mantra. They can never answer individual questions because it immediately illustrates the flaws in their theory of how the market is working.

As for the defintion of property, the only one that matters is the how the market views property and that is anything of value that is under at least some control. So ideas in the marketplace are treated like property, it doesn't matter what definition anyone else has of it.

Again, well done JP and Skylark. The anti-protection of ideas crowd and anti-contract group have been sent back to the drawing board.

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 10:22 AM | Locked

MacFall:

My sincere apologies, I mistook another poster's argument for your own. It was a strawman in that sense, I was arguing against someone else.

No problem :-)

I think that I just got LS and you to agree with Jack and I's position. Assuming LS doesnt come back today and refute my last post, which I dont believe he will, then we can call this argument closed.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 10:39 AM | Locked

i feel confident to speak for LS as well as myself. the concept of Intellectual property is bankrupt. its a conceptual contradiction. it can not be rationally maintained. there is some serious crazyness on this board. and a good dose of cognitive dissonance

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 10:56 AM | Locked

nirgrahamUK:
i feel confident to speak for LS as well as myself. the concept of Intellectual property is bankrupt. its a conceptual contradiction. it can not be rationally maintained. there is some serious crazyness on this board. and a good dose of cognitive dissonance

The concept of IP, sure. Neither Jack nor myself were arguing for the conept of IP. Rather copyright, and the inventor's right to protect his invention. Macfall, LS, et al seem to have agreed that a protection scheme based around voluntary contract is a valid, if cumbersome, method of doing this. Again, my involvement with this conversation is not to discuss the relevance of the term IP, but rather to make my point about inventor's protecting their creations. I think we have settled this.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 11:13 AM | Locked

JParker:

Neither Jack nor myself were arguing for the concept of IP

oh really?
JackSkyLark:

In this way, without some form of IP (free-market contract or some legal standing), there is no reward for the development of a digital product (or any other infinite good)
later on
Once again, I am not saying this is good or bad, but rather what I believe would happen to the market for infinite goods, in the absence of any form of IP.
even better
But as to why I am posting, I assert that anyone who is in complete disregard of IP is just as detrimental to liberty as a communist.

JParker:

Current IP laws are a form of fascism, sure. IP, not so much.
Granted, IP is so overblown it's laughable right now, but basic IP/copyright laws should exist.
Without IP, why would anyone produce anything but tangible goods?

MaxLiberty:

So Coke does not have traditional government IP protection it has marketplace IP protection

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 11:28 AM | Locked

You're pulling quotes where we use the term IP b/c its commonly understood. We're referring to copyright. Clinging to our use of the term IP doesnt say we're arguing for the concept of IP as it exists today. The term is dynamic, and in our context references copyright.. as the post you quoted of mine alludes to with me putting copyright right next to IP.

**also, please dont include max's argument within my own. Same mistake macfall made just a bit ago. If you have issue with him, talk to him. I am not making the same argument

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 11:39 AM | Locked

so what, you agree with me and LS that IP is a contradictary concept, it makes no sense. yet you feel happy using it to get your message out. ???

the words 'intellectual' and 'property' cant go together and mean anything.

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 11:57 AM | Locked

Then replace them with the word copyright in every statement i've made in this thread. If your argument with me really is semantics, you're wasting both of our time.

If however you dont agree with my (or macfall's) hypotheticals as to how copyright could be enforced through the market, please make that case.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 12:06 PM | Locked

if libertarian institutions can provide the kind of copyright you feel important in a voluntary fashion. how could i oppose it morally? or conceptually?

i do feel that its overly optimistic on your part. as a copyright (on its own, outside of other laws or contracts) could not bind 3rd parties, it would only take a single contract breaker (where potentially a copyrighted work may have millions of customers , i.e. potential breakers). for the cat to be out of the bag, and the balloon of conract secracy to pop. perhaps the devices of freemarket will be so engenius they will think their way out of these problems, but that remains to be seen.

I hope that from now on you will be consistant and not use 'unwords' in place of your perfectly servicable vocabulary.

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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liberty student replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 12:57 PM | Locked

JParker:
f you're willing to concede that by copying a book/software/etc when you had agreed in contract not to do so

Why would I argue otherwise?  Again, you're the minarchist, I'm not.  I believe in voluntary contracts.  If I agree to a contract, I should try to abide by it, or be prepared to pay the costs of not fulfilling it.  You on the other hand, have supported a system of non-voluntary contracts.  That, I do not agree with.  Coercion is wrong, under all circumstances.

JParker:
Granted, you say you wouldn't want to sign the contract, or it would be a hassle to buy a book and have to sign all these documents, but if it was the only way to get at most books, wouldnt you?

Yeah, but it wouldn't be.  The market has already shown that people will surrender IP for markt share.  Mises.org does it very successfully with it's bookstore. There are numerous other examples.  Which is to be expected, because exclusivity is just something else to negotiate when setting prices.  If I have no need to purchase your IP exclusivity, then someone will fill that market void and provide IP without exclusivity in contracts for a lower price (or a higher price, depending on the circumstance).

JParker:
I never suggested such.

Yes you have.  It's been referenced by both myself and NUK.

JParker:
I have said that if someone came up with it independently, they have as much right to it as I.

The burden of proof would be on you to prove they did not do it independently.  So unless you have the resources, and the confidence you can establish a burden of proof, this is a business killing move, trying to enforce IP.

It's substantially different than the current IP model in the US.

JParker:
But we argue to enforce the creator's rights through this measure of contracts, not government coercion.

So you're advocating the end of all IP laws?

JParker:
I don't think we have a disconnect on this issue after all, you're merely assuming that we're referencing the state, when we are in fact not.

But you guys are.  Because you claim to ba minarchist, and the role of government is the protection of rights and property.  So if you are for government protection, and you consider IP a form of property that can be contracted, then it logically follows that you expect the state to enforce your "property" rights.

I'm not the one who is confused.  I'm crystal clear.  IP is not property.  Using the state to enforce IP is coercion.  Coercion is wrong.

"When you're young you worry about people stealing your ideas, when you're old you worry that they won't." - David Friedman
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liberty student replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:00 PM | Locked

nirgrahamUK:

i feel confident to speak for LS as well as myself. the concept of Intellectual property is bankrupt. its a conceptual contradiction. it can not be rationally maintained. there is some serious crazyness on this board. and a good dose of cognitive dissonance

100%.  IP is not property.  No one responded to my property definition post.  Probably, because it's the most powerful thing I have written in weeks.

Property cannot exist in two or more places, with two or more owners simultaneously.  By this standard, IP is not property.  Everything else is moot.  Utilitarianism, moralism, statism, Maxism.  Irrelevant.

There is cognitive dissonance, because we have minarchists trying to defend coercion and state created artificial monopolies.  Those are indefensible positions.

 

"When you're young you worry about people stealing your ideas, when you're old you worry that they won't." - David Friedman
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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:22 PM | Locked

liberty student:
There is cognitive dissonance, because we have minarchists trying to defend coercion and state created artificial monopolies.  Those are indefensible positions.

*sigh* I am a minarchist. My argument was made in the frame of your complete anarchy. I am able to make an argument from outside my own beleifs. Please examine my argument again: not once is the state referenced, only voluntary contract.

 

 

liberty student:
But you guys are.  Because you claim to ba minarchist, and the role of government is the protection of rights and property.  So if you are for government protection, and you consider IP a form of property that can be contracted, then it logically follows that you expect the state to enforce your "property" rights.

What I believe and what I argued here are two different things. I played along with your stateless world, and demonstrated how the market would protect "IP" (copyright). No state is involved in my scenario, no matter how much you want to inject it in to make my argument easy to refute.

 

liberty student:
The burden of proof would be on you to prove they did not do it independently.  So unless you have the resources, and the confidence you can establish a burden of proof, this is a business killing move, trying to enforce IP.

It's substantially different than the current IP model in the US.

 Well of course its different than the current laws, thats why we're saying its different. And of course the burden of proof would be upon the original person. If its worth defending, or he truely beleives the other person broke the contract, the burden of proof is upon him. I fail to see how this refutes anything i've said.

liberty student:
Yeah, but it wouldn't be.  The market has already shown that people will surrender IP for markt share.  Mises.org does it very successfully with it's bookstore. There are numerous other examples.  Which is to be expected, because exclusivity is just something else to negotiate when setting prices.  If I have no need to purchase your IP exclusivity, then someone will fill that market void and provide IP without exclusivity in contracts for a lower price (or a higher price, depending on the circumstance).
Once again, where is the refutation of my point? I never said someone couldnt give away thier book for free. I said there would be protection available for those who thought it worth it. Photoshop software (highly expensive to develope, limited market to sell to), cold fusion, etc grand ideas would probably use this protection. But you seem to say that this protection is possible, which refutes you saying that its worthless because its not property. The market values it, the market protects its exclusivity. Thats all i've argued for, is that such exclusivity via copyright CAN and WOULD exist in a stateless society. You have yet to refute this.

 

liberty student:
Property cannot exist in two or more places, with two or more owners simultaneously.  By this standard, IP is not property.  Everything else is moot.  Utilitarianism, moralism, statism, Maxism.  Irrelevant.

:-) I'm going to be totally evil here, but then by your very definition, nothing qualifies as property. Physics has essentially proven the existance of multiple universes (multiverse theory, as demonstrated through einstein and hawking's works, and proven countless times). This multiverse allows for things to exist and not exist at the same time, for you to own your house in one universe, and someone else to own it in another. Both universes are completely real, by all natrual laws. Therefore, because 'property' cannot exist in twho places at once, or be owned by two people at once, nothing that exists within the multiverse can be owned. Thus, nothing is property. Everything else is moot. All bow before the physics god!

*While multiverse theory is completely true, I am obviously kididng in applying it to this situation, so dont waste your time actually trying to refute that argument.

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liberty student replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:42 PM | Locked

JParker:
*sigh* I am a minarchist. My argument was made in the frame of your complete anarchy. I am able to make an argument from outside my own beleifs. Please examine my argument again: not once is the state referenced, only voluntary contract.

JParker:
What I believe and what I argued here are two different things. I played along with your stateless world, and demonstrated how the market would protect "IP" (copyright). No state is involved in my scenario, no matter how much you want to inject it in to make my argument easy to refute.

Yes, when you copy my position, we agree.  However, that's not your real position.  I'm not arguing with people who are pretending to agree with me.

No offense, but it's a complete waste of time arguing with you.  Thanks for the insincere argument.

"When you're young you worry about people stealing your ideas, when you're old you worry that they won't." - David Friedman
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kiba replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:45 PM | Locked

JParker:

kiba:

Absolutely pathetic. Your concerns has already been addressed ad nasuem in books like Against Intellectual Monopoly, on websites, and on this thread. No business model apperantly, can please you.

Kiba, your 'business model' was disproven by me long ago. Work for hire is not an answer, as it only solves the small jobs that any college kid (aka you) could complete.

kiba:
Other people already did and will make a profit inventing stuff/writing softwares/etc. So shut up your whining about how you won't produce X without Y. Because clearly, you sucks at entrepreneurship and deserve to starve on the street.

Compelling evidence. I see your schooling has taught you well. First i'm 'fucking stupid' now 'i suck and deserve to starve on the street'. If you aren't prepared to actually provide a response, please refrain from speaking to me.

You're "fucking stupid" because you happen to misread me several time already? I recalled calling you fucking clueless but never stupid.

It is not an answer how? You have not disproven it.

You haven't show how it won't work on the large scale. I clearly show that it can work on large scale with people raising larger amount of money than me and were much more skilled than me. As a matter of fact, let me throw in blender in and the attempt to free Ryzom MMORPG. Blender raised 100K euros to become free and open source and Ryzom  to my knowledge reached their  pledge drive.

And yes, you sucks and deserve to starve on the street because clearly some businessmen times and times again do it all the time.

http://libregamewiki.org - The world's only encyclopedia on free(as in freedom) gaming.

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Nitroadict replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:48 PM | Locked

JParker:

:-) I'm going to be totally evil here, but then by your very definition, nothing qualifies as property. Physics has essentially proven the existance of multiple universes (multiverse theory, as demonstrated through einstein and hawking's works, and proven countless times). This multiverse allows for things to exist and not exist at the same time, for you to own your house in one universe, and someone else to own it in another. Both universes are completely real, by all natrual laws. Therefore, because 'property' cannot exist in twho places at once, or be owned by two people at once, nothing that exists within the multiverse can be owned. Thus, nothing is property. Everything else is moot. All bow before the physics god!

*While multiverse theory is completely true, I am obviously kididng in applying it to this situation, so dont waste your time actually trying to refute that argument.



Where's the concrete evidence beyond mathematic models & the beauty of said models? 

AFAIK, It has mounting theoretic evidence, but I have not read of recently the indisputable evidence that this is true.  That you are claiming the multiverse theory to be completely true is complete idiocy on your part, regardless of the argument your using it in. 

You, or anyone else for that matter, are kidding yourself in claiming scientific theory as fact prematurely, when there you haven't provided proof, let alone a simple citation or link.  

I'm afraid you are being a bit evil here; hijacking a scientific theory before it is completely proven by evidence towards the perceived statement of "nothing qualifies as property" is too mystical for my scientific tastes.

Btw, good job at incorrectly thinking the market will do this or that as if it were a being (another mystical projection?).  A free-market might have free-market agents attempting some form of I.P. (especially in light of a transactionary period between the state & stateless society), and other agents might eventualyl outcompete it's use by seeing the problems of I.P. 

You can't really predict how the market of a stateless society will look like, anymore than you can predict how the television industry will look like in 50 years.  I suppose the crystal ball obsessions continue on this forum, regardless.

*On the off chance you were being sarcastic about a theory not proven yet as being true, I take back the allotted criticism. 

"Look at me, I'm quoting another user to show how wrong I think they are, out of arrogance of my own position. Wait, this is my own quote, oh shi-" ~ Nitroadict

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:50 PM | Locked

liberty student:

Yes, when you copy my position, we agree.  However, that's not your real position.  I'm not arguing with people who are pretending to agree with me.

No offense, but it's a complete waste of time arguing with you.  Thanks for the insincere argument.

You (or someone in this thread, may not have been you) made the argument that copyright would NEVER be used in a free society. I presented the argument of exactly how a stateless world WOULD have and enforce copyright. This was all I wanted to prove, and I feel that I did. Refusing to recognize that becacuse its not what I personally would like to see happen doesnt make it less true. But fine, I'm done posting in regard to copyright on this site. I feel i've made my point.

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Nitroadict replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 1:57 PM | Locked

JParker:

liberty student:

Yes, when you copy my position, we agree.  However, that's not your real position.  I'm not arguing with people who are pretending to agree with me.

No offense, but it's a complete waste of time arguing with you.  Thanks for the insincere argument.

You (or someone in this thread, may not have been you) made the argument that copyright would NEVER be used in a free society. I presented the argument of exactly how a stateless world WOULD have and enforce copyright. This was all I wanted to prove, and I feel that I did. Refusing to recognize that becacuse its not what I personally would like to see happen doesn't make it less true. But fine, I'm done posting in regard to copyright on this site. I feel i've made my point.

I think the point is that in a stateless society, there is no guarantee that I.P. would be utilized as much as it is now, or if it wouldn't be outcompeted by no one or a majority not utilizing I.P. 

If there was something forcing the use of I.P. beyond a voluntary agreement, contracts etc. this force would violate the free-market itself.

"Look at me, I'm quoting another user to show how wrong I think they are, out of arrogance of my own position. Wait, this is my own quote, oh shi-" ~ Nitroadict

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 2:02 PM | Locked

so.........Jpark and Jack....is Intellectual Property a meaningful phrase? how so?

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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Spideynw replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 2:22 PM | Locked

JParker:
You (or someone in this thread, may not have been you) made the argument that copyright would NEVER be used in a free society. I presented the argument of exactly how a stateless world WOULD have and enforce copyright. This was all I wanted to prove, and I feel that I did. Refusing to recognize that becacuse its not what I personally would like to see happen doesnt make it less true. But fine, I'm done posting in regard to copyright on this site. I feel i've made my point.

Yes, contracts would exist in a stateless society, and just like Coke has kept their recipe a secret, the same thing could be used for other recipes.  But not for music or art.  Why would anyone pay for music they could not play?  Or an art piece they cannot display?

At most, I think only 5% of the adult population would need to stop cooperating to have real change.

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 2:44 PM | Locked

Spideynw:
Yes, contracts would exist in a stateless society, and just like Coke has kept their recipe a secret, the same thing could be used for other recipes.  But not for music or art.  Why would anyone pay for music they could not play?  Or an art piece they cannot display?

mind you.......some people are weeeeeeeird.

 

(some even believe in intellectual property¬!)

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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hayekianxyz replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:19 PM | Locked

JParker:

What I believe and what I argued here are two different things. I played along with your stateless world, and demonstrated how the market would protect "IP" (copyright). No state is involved in my scenario, no matter how much you want to inject it in to make my argument easy to refute.

 

You jumped from "it could protect IP without inconsistancy" to "it would protect IP".

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"

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Maxliberty replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:23 PM | Locked

Nitroadict:

I think the point is that in a stateless society, there is no guarantee that I.P. would be utilized as much as it is now, or if it wouldn't be outcompeted by no one or a majority not utilizing I.P. 

If there was something forcing the use of I.P. beyond a voluntary agreement, contracts etc. this force would violate the free-market itself.

Non-compete and Non-disclosure agreements exist in the free market. These contracts essentially serve the same function as patent or copyright protection without government coercion. These agreements exist now in the free-market, why would we not expect them to exist in a future free market? This is one of the major points. The market is already dealing with this issue via voluntary contracts and other mechanisms, why will what is occurring in the free-market now not occur in the free-market in the future?

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:24 PM | Locked

i think he has made some small progress. instead of IP, he now writes "IP"(copyright)

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:26 PM | Locked

Maxliberty:
Non-compete and Non-disclosure agreements exist in the free market. These contracts essentially serve the same function as patent or copyright protection without government coercion. These agreements exist now in the free-market, why would we not expect them to exist in a future free market? This is one of the major points. The market is already dealing with this issue via voluntary contracts and other mechanisms, why will what is occurring in the free-market now not occur in the free-market in the future?

you are strawman-ing, and also off topic.,check the title. Meambobo wanted to talk about the dispute between IP believers and "IP" deniers. not about how well secrets can be kept in a free market, or how contracts can influence how people behave.

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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Maxliberty replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:29 PM | Locked

Spideynw:

Yes, contracts would exist in a stateless society, and just like Coke has kept their recipe a secret, the same thing could be used for other recipes.  But not for music or art.  Why would anyone pay for music they could not play?  Or an art piece they cannot display?

Protecting your ideas or inventions simply creates barriers to entry. If your in a business it is good to create barriers to future entrants. If these barriers can be created through voluntary contracts or other voluntary mechanisms then why should I be prevented from doing that? I don't think anyone has suggested that efforts to protect ideas will guarantee complete protection of the idea. 

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hayekianxyz replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:31 PM | Locked

Maxliberty:
Protecting your ideas or inventions simply creates barriers to entry. If your in a business it is good to create barriers to future entrants. If these barriers can be created through voluntary contracts or other voluntary mechanisms then why should I be prevented from doing that? I don't think anyone has suggested that efforts to protect ideas will guarantee complete protection of the idea. 

Unless you consider not being a good entrepreneur to be a barrier to entry, your contractual agreements aren't either.

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"

Bob Dylan

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hayekianxyz replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:31 PM | Locked

Maxliberty:
Protecting your ideas or inventions simply creates barriers to entry. If your in a business it is good to create barriers to future entrants. If these barriers can be created through voluntary contracts or other voluntary mechanisms then why should I be prevented from doing that? I don't think anyone has suggested that efforts to protect ideas will guarantee complete protection of the idea. 

Unless you consider not being a good entrepreneur to be a barrier to entry, your contractual agreements aren't either.

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"

Bob Dylan

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Maxliberty replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:40 PM | Locked

nirgrahamUK:

Maxliberty:
Non-compete and Non-disclosure agreements exist in the free market. These contracts essentially serve the same function as patent or copyright protection without government coercion. These agreements exist now in the free-market, why would we not expect them to exist in a future free market? This is one of the major points. The market is already dealing with this issue via voluntary contracts and other mechanisms, why will what is occurring in the free-market now not occur in the free-market in the future?

you are strawman-ing, and also off topic.,check the title. Meambobo wanted to talk about the dispute between IP believers and "IP" deniers. not about how well secrets can be kept in a free market, or how contracts can influence how people behave.

You should go back and read the original post then. The OP's main point is what would happen to innovation in the absence of IP laws. The arguement I make is that the market has already addressed this issue and that we would expect to see those types of solutions continue, namely contracts. There would be instances where this might be easier in some cases but the market has already shown this to be an effective method in some cases. So it is not a choice between protecting of ideas and not protecting ideas, it is a decision of is the cost of protecting the idea lmore than the anticipated loss of revenue from not protecting it.  In the case where the cost is too great then you will probably not see any attempt to protect ideas and in the cases where the cost is less then you would expect some effort to protect the idea.

This is why your fascination with the defintion of IP is pointless and why I used specific examples. The market has moved beyond our discussion. It doesn't require your approval of any particular defintion in order to function. 

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Maxliberty replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:45 PM | Locked

GilesStratton:

Maxliberty:
Protecting your ideas or inventions simply creates barriers to entry. If your in a business it is good to create barriers to future entrants. If these barriers can be created through voluntary contracts or other voluntary mechanisms then why should I be prevented from doing that? I don't think anyone has suggested that efforts to protect ideas will guarantee complete protection of the idea. 

Unless you consider not being a good entrepreneur to be a barrier to entry, your contractual agreements aren't either.

I am not sure of your point. Back to the Coke example, they are using NDA to protect their idea. This protection makes it more difficult to reproduce the same product. Competitors are required to at least conduct their own research even if they are just trying to reverse engineer the product. So protecting the idea creates a barrier to entry without coercion. Coke's NDA (patent contracts if you will) appear to have raised a successful barrier to entry and allowed Coke to capture the value of the original idea all without any coercion.

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hayekianxyz replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:46 PM | Locked

It's not a barrier to entry, that's all I was saying.

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 3:54 PM | Locked

wrong again max, i checked the OP. earlier on before we had presented our refutation of the "Ideas can be Property" fallacy, the original poster claimed that mises.org was frequented by anti-IP utopian fantasists, who didnt credit the idea that there was IP..

of couse there isnt IP, so we arent fantasist. IPers are fantasist.

 

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 4:02 PM | Locked

nirgrahamUK:

wrong again max, i checked the OP. earlier on before we had presented our refutation of the "Ideas can be Property" fallacy, the original poster claimed that mises.org was frequented by anti-IP utopian fantasists, who didnt credit the idea that there was IP..

of couse there isnt IP, so we arent fantasist. IPers are fantasist.

I'm sorry, but only by your limited definition of what IP is. I say copyright is IP. Copyright exists, as you I believe agreed. Therefore to me, IP exists. If I say Dodo's are birds, but dodo's are now extinct, and thus dont exist, birds dont exist, thats a fallacy correct? You're assuming that because you dont believe in patent and coersion in support of copyright that IP cannot exist. Get over your semantics, its just the term thats used. Your assertations that 'of course there isn't ip' is not an argument, but rather you applying your semantic understanding of a common phrase incorrectly. This is akin to me saying that you in fact are NOT a supporter of anarchy, because you agree to voluntary government (protection firms, courts, etc). Anarchy means absolutely no form of leadership or interference in personal preference at all! This is semantic misunderstanding of the way you use the term. Ditto with you and IP. Please get over it

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hayekianxyz replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 4:04 PM | Locked

JParker:
I say copyright is IP.

How so? By your own standards you claim to not own the idea that you're selling, merely making a contract regarding said idea when you sell/ buy the good in question.

 

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"

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nirgrahamUK replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 4:18 PM | Locked

JParker, i caution you to be careful how you answer the following.

---copyright is IP?--

is it a A ⇔ B equivalence?

or is it copright -> IP

or is it IP->copyright.

 

if you says its A ⇔ B then you are basically saying that copyright says all yo want to , and despite IP being such a loaded term whose proponents occupy a wide tent and are broadly absurd, it still a worthwhile endeavour, to stick to your guns. and say IP, when all you mean is copyright. and you could just always say copyright.

 

 

Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid

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JParker replied on Wed, Feb 4 2009 4:29 PM | Locked

nirgrahamUK:

JParker, i caution you to be careful how you answer the following.

---copyright is IP?--

is it a A ⇔ B equivalence?

or is it copright -> IP

or is it IP->copyright.

 

if you says its A ⇔ B then you are basically saying that copyright says all yo want to , and despite IP being such a loaded term whose proponents occupy a wide tent and are broadly absurd, it still a worthwhile endeavour, to stick to your guns. and say IP, when all you mean is copyright. and you could just always say copyright.

Copyright, as you understand it, is all I argue for. I type IP because that's the title of the post, its easier to type, and the current umbrella of ''IP" covers copyright. I say IP because the definition should be changed. Now, because its so hard to say IP and not be blasted by calls of statist!, I will stop using it and just say copyright. But to me they're synonymous.

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