From: ChuckKuecker (ckuecker@mcs.net)
Date: Sat May 02 1998 - 11:12:47 MDT
At 21:04 5/1/98 -0400, you wrote:
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>
>ChuckKuecker wrote:
>>As long as it takes large amounts of capital to develop a patent or
>>copyrighted work, we will need this protection, as unscrupulous persons are
>>then free to let you do the designing and then sell your idea without giving
>>you any value.
>
>Rules, not tools, eh?
>
>Since it is the DEVELOPMENT of an idea, not its distribution, which is
>costly, why not charge money for its development? In other words, couldn't
>you develop your idea at full cost and then, since you've got the only one,
>sell it (using encryption and various other privacy tools) to the highest
>bidder? Wouldn't that recompense you the cost of your idea? And wouldn't
>that prevent people from "stealing" it, without creating a government
>enforced monopoly?
Who is going to purchase a product no one has ever seen, on the say-so of
the designer? People want to see what they are buying actually work, unless
they are really stupid..
Before you get paid for developing an idea like we did, you need to find a
market, or develop one. After we do all the hard work, we can then produce
and sell our products, or sell the rights to the patents to others, who then
have the same rights.
Without the patent, anyone who wants to make knock-off copies of our product
is free to do so, and piggyback on our market research and development. We
sweat, they gain.
Anyway, it's darn hard to encrypt a mostly physical device..We don't have
the replicator, yet..
What is to stop anyone who wants to reverse engineer the product and tool up
to make copies? Their overhead is now less by all the time spent in the
original development, so they can sell for less. This would quickly dry up
any investment capital for R+D of anything other than software with strong
encoding. Who wants to risk development time and money if anyone is welcome
to steal it?
>
>The current patent strategy is comparable to leaving your front door open
>and unlocked and putting out a big sign on your front lawn saying "No
>trespassers. Violators will be prosecuted." This strategy is more like
>putting a LOCK on your door and putting a big sign on your lawn saying
>"Just you TRY to get in. Prosecutors will be violated." :)
>
That's why our products are potted assemblies. We want to make it as hard as
possible for the knock-off artists..
Even in the absence of a government monopoly, there needs to be some
protection for inventors and creators - at least until 'everything' is free,
and new developments are created just for the love of creation..
Chuck Kuecker
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