Showing messages 1 through 4 of 4.

• Ideas are not property
  2005-06-22 10:58:32  Spencer Critchley | [View]
  
  
  Very interesting points. But it still seems to me that drawing a distinction between ideas and their implementation, or between ideas and physical objects, doesn't let us off the hook of having to decide consciously in each case what is private property and what isn't. The only reason a piece of land becomes property is that we decide it's property. We're not forced to do that - some other cultures have no privately owned land. But in our culture we've decided rightly or wrongly that having privately owned land yields economic benefits for the many that outwiegh the disadvantages to some.
  
  Similarly with ideas. The US and other governments have decided to allow private control over the right to copy new ideas (copyright) because it rewards innovators, and innovation leads to economic growth, a benefit for the many. But there's nothing inherent in an idea that makes it property, just like there's nothing inherent in land that makes it property - in both cases it's an intellectual decision. These governments believe innovation would go down if an innovator's new ideas immediately became free, since the innovator would be taking on risk with no reward, and there seems to be no economic system where that works - what people do when they can't earn a reward is to minimize their risk.
  
  It's clear to me that some kinds of ideas should be free, such as ideas about what the government is doing, or how music theory works. And I agree that there should be reasonable limits on copyright protection, such as expiration dates, and restrictions on copyrighting public domain material such as fairy tales, as Disney seems to have done. But all of these things are decisions that we have to make based on what we value. I don't see any absolute quality in ideas or objects that will make the decisions for us.
  
  The argument is often made that you can take information without depleting the original, unlike the situation with physical property. But I think this is based on a confusion. In both cases the value of the property depends on society's agreement that it has value. If someone takes a chunk of gold away from me, I do have less gold. But in a culture that sees no special value in gold, it would make no difference. (I might even pay them to do it, say to get that yellow rock out of my garden.) With a new idea, we've decided on copyright as a way to reward innovators - it's an artificial decision, but so is the value assigned to gold. If someone copies my new idea, they're not depleting my idea, but they are depleting my copyright, where the economic value is.
  
  In a few cases, like food, shelter and medicine, the value of physical objects does seem to be inherent, since life depends on them. But even here, if we notice that by rewarding innovation through copyright we'll end up with more food, better shelter and better medicine, and that therefore fewer people will die, then we're not many steps removed from that inherent value. Should we decide instead that we won't have copyright because information by its very nature is free? Or is there a system in which all information is free and under which we also get the benefit of lots of innovation? If there is, I haven't heard of it but would like to.
  
  It seems to me that with property we're always led back into having to decide what we think is the best solution under our values and under the circumstances. If we decide that all recorded music should be free for example, we may expand its availability, at least in the short term. But we will also be depriving many professional songwriters and composers of the ability to make a living (performers, if they're young and healthy enough, could earn a reduced living by performing). Such people have taken on the risk of trying to become expert at what they do, and the good ones do it much better than lay people can. If they can't make a living at it, they'll have to stop. It could be that society decides that's OK, but my point is that it's still a decision.
  
  
• Ideas are not property
  2005-06-25 13:49:15  Alkon [View]
  
  

  I understand the way your thoughts flow. Yes, there is nothing inherent in
  something that makes it property - it becomes property by decision. That is
  true. But it is trivially true, because every concept that people have is by
  decision. Acoustic waves become music only because we perceive it as music i.e.
  by decision. Some musical subcultures perceive as music what others perceive as
  irritating noise - it is all by decision. We can spread this way of thinking to
  absolutely anything we have in our human universe. This absoluteness is what
  actually "makes" this way trivial - trivial things are absolute. But, there is
  good common words for this - "simplicity is worse than a theft" (you may know
  it worded differently).

  
  

  The non-trivial thing is WHAT we decide. And also, who those "we" who
  decide. Let me explain. Following your argument, we can say that there is
  nothing inherent in, say, ... human beings ... that makes them property -
  humans become someone's property by decision. We actually had cultures in the
  past, that treated humans as property (slaves) of other humans. The only reason
  a human being become property is that we decide it's property. Say, in our
  culture we've decided rightly or wrongly that having privately owned human
  beings yields economic benefits for the many that outweigh the disadvantages to
  some (guess who)... But is it the RIGHT decision to have humans as privately
  owned property, even if it would yield economic benefits? Has United States
  abolished slavery just because slavery stopped yielding economic benefits? Was
  there civil war to abolish slavery just because North though there is no more
  economic benefits out of it, even if South definitely though there is yet some
  to extract. (This, actually, a very good analogy to understand current
  out-of-control situation - someone still want to extract huge economic benefits
  for themselves at the expense of society out turning ideas into property, and
  nothing but "civil war" can stop them.) And would you, personally, agree to
  become someone's property, even not inherently - just by decision, just because
  it yields economic benefits... I hope not.

  
  

  This leads us to conclusion that there is something, yes, inherent in WHAT
  we decide, that precludes us from making human beings a commercial property.
  Put differently, there is something inherent in human beings that precludes us
  from making them private property. Absolutely same way, there is something
  inherent in ideas, that precludes us from making them private property (with
  patents). Same way we strive to protect our freedom, freedom of speech and a
  like - there is something inherent in all this...

  
  

  This is it, ideas cannot be property, they are not patentable. But specific
  implementation of ideas can perfectly be made property with copyright. (In the
  context of above argument, it is same to that humans cannot be slaves, but can
  perfectly be employees.) For example, specific Mozart symphony is the
  implementation of musical ideas, say, passion (may be it is not well "timed"
  example, but it doesn't matter). That implementation is copyrighted and Mozart
  holds copyright on it. It is perfectly OK, cause it makes private property only
  very specific implementation of music idea, and humans are perfectly free to
  implement music idea of passion their own way, again and again, as they like.
  But issuing patent on music idea of passion would prevent people from writing
  another symphony that "implements" music idea of passion, and only someone in
  possession of patent has "right" to write passionate music - definitely it
  automatically creates badly smelling monopoly and monopolistic profit
  opportunities that create covert efforts for such patentability at the first
  place. Patent on music idea of passion is actually a crime against humanity -
  same way like turning humans into slaves, depriving of freedom, even if it is
  "mere" freedom of speech, are also a crimes against humanity. But patents on
  music ideas are exactly what patents on algorithms, software and business
  methods all about. They attempt to turn entire idea, not specific
  implementation of it, into someone's property. And, like slavery, it is
  INHERENTLY and fundamentally bad thing.

  
  

  In addition to being inherently and fundamentally bad thing, turning ideas
  into private property (with patents) is also very harmful to society at large,
  cause it kills innovation. But it is very beneficial to the few, at the expense
  of society, and this is the only reason why it exists and even resists its
  removal - those few make all they can (and they are mighty few) to preserve
  their patented monopolies to earn abnormal profits at the expense of society.
  Same way there was large resistance to abolishment of slavery - such a large
  resistance that only war can overcame it.

  
  
• Ideas are not property
  2005-06-25 16:17:44  Spencer Critchley | [View]
  
  
  It sounds like we actually agree with other on a lot of this, and that I misunderstood your use of the words "ideas" and "implementation". I agree with you that "ideas cannot be property, they are not patentable. But specific
  implementation of ideas can perfectly be made property with copyright", in your sense that general ideas like passion can't and shouldn't be copyrighted, but a specific piece of passionate music by Mozart can be.
  
  The distinction I'm making is simply between intellectual and physical property, and I'm challenging the idea held by some that all information, including any specific piece of music, should be free because of some inherent quality it has as information. I'm saying that we consciously decide what is property in all cases, and that we should decide consciously, not automatically. (And of course people should always be outside the category of property.)
  
  
• Ideas are not property
  2005-06-26 15:06:44  Alkon [View]
  
  

  I think the extreme view that any information is inherently non-proprietary
  just because it is information is simply a misperception of some new business
  models that some industry players tried to push for. It seems to me that
  "information wants to be free" slogan was actually coined in an effort to
  market new business models that give away copyrighted information (like music)
  freely and have revenue collection point somewhere else, but that slogan was
  (and likely was intended to be) misunderstood as if absolutely all information
  is inherently non-proprietary, which would generally be wrong. Nevertheless, my
  point is that generally it still possible to have something that is
  inherently non-proprietary, and that ideas inherently, as well as by
  decision, should not be allowed to become someone's property.

  
  

  Anyway, I am glad that we understood each other.