> Yes, stealing work without permission is a crime; fraudulently claiming
> authorship or invetion is a crime; but copyrights and patents aren't
> aimed at those actions: they are aimed specifically at preventing, by
> force, the use of information legally obtained. If I invent something,
> I will keep the idea under wraps with non-disclosure agreements while
> it is being developed, and you bet I'd prosecute anyone who broke his
> contract or stole from my safe. But if I freely choose to sell the
> thing on the open market where anyone can see how it works, I have no
> right to have the government use its guns to prevent those folks from
> going into business against me.
Ok, by that same logic. If I were to write a book and publish it on the
open market. Why shouldn't folks be able to copy it and sell it as
there own with the resulting royalties? After all, its on the open
market.
>
> > Not having a system of protections for these future oriented people
> > would give the lazy and oportunistic the right to benefit from the work
> > of others - not a very libertarian concept. Besides, patents expire
> > (voila IBM clones) giving others the right to benefit from the
> > advancement, but also giving the individual(s) their just rewards.
>
> I agree that "a system" should do that. I just disagree that it should
> be government force. Private contracts and private technologies work.
I'm as big a fan of the freedom to contract as anyone. Here's a hypo for
you. If I were to create, say a new type of hard disk that stored 1000X
the information of the current industry standard. How would i be able
to prevent every other manufacturer from benefiting from my R&D in the
absence of a patent?
-- Jeff Coulter jefcou@ix.netcom.com http://people.delphi.com/jefcou