From: Lee Daniel Crocker (lcrocker@mercury.colossus.net)
Date: Mon May 03 1999 - 09:24:50 MDT
>> If you support theft by State grant (copyright), why not taxes?
>
> How is a copyright theft by state grant? I view it as a 'brand"
> to identify one's property
> EvMick
That's a trademark, not a copyright. Trademarks are just like
real property in that they are genuinely scarce, and have value
in their scarcity. It is not possible for two people to use
the same name without interference. Indeed, they are economic
"diamond goods", whose only value /is/ their scarcity, so it
is theoretically possible that government could pay for itself
by being the central registry of names and have no negative
effects on the economy--I'm surprised this hasn't been brought
up more often.
Copyright is different--by claiming a copyright to a piece of
information, the government is aiding you in enforcing a monopoly
on /all copies/ of that information produced by anyone--even
those that can be used by many people without interference. My
use of a book does not interfere with yours or anyone's. If I
make copies of it, I do not diminish anyone else's use, but I do
compete with the author's market. Our government has decided
that protecting the market for authors and inventors is worth
granting this monopoly--that is certainly arguable, because we
do not generally protect markets in other things.
-- Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lcrocker.html> "All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past, are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Nov 01 2002 - 15:03:40 MST