John Fields wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 13:06:21 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:

You don't know what you're talking about and, in fact, without
intellectual property our lives would be pretty boring. Just think,
no music, no poetry, no computer programs... Also, no antibiotics.
Wanna go back to that kind of a life?

I don't, and I'm no longer interested in this dialogue.

Rather ignorant assumptions you are making, considering that all of
your examples were well established traditions BEFORE the became
considered ownable "intellectual property"

---
Well, sometimes it takes a while before we can figure out what
something should be called, but the fact remains that if someone
thinks up a way to do something it was _their_ intellect which
allowed them to do it, so that means that the intellectual property
(which is the way to do it) belongs to them.

Yes, as it consists of only a neural arrangment in their head. Or
perhaps a collection of notes in their possession, symbolic
information, or perhaps in binary form on a hard drive. Any theft of
these objects is a clear violoation of your rights. Especially the
head.

Once others have seen or recorded this information, they now also
possess copies of that information. If you don't want anyone to know,
you'd better be careful who you tell.


let's do a little thought experiment, OK? See if you can keep up...

Let's say that my name is Isaac Newton and that I've come up with a
way to describe, in exquisite detail, the motions of the planets
around the sun, but I don't tell anyone how it works, I just sell
them the data.

Since I'm the one who invented the method and I'm the only one who
knows how to make it work, who would you say the method (and the
data, BTW) belonged to, before I sold it? To you?

To someone else?

Who?


Johannes Kepler

Or maybe some other giants who's shoulders you've stood upon.

Now that you've told me you have such an idea Isaac, I would be
curious. Probably not much commercial application however. Have you
tried to write or sell your idea as a proposal to some religious or
academic bigwigs? Perhaps you'd best publish it openly in a concise
form and you'll have any academic job offer you'd like and more. As
for your ideas about calculus, you should have published them openly
much earlier. Sure, you still obtained fame and fortune, but with his
earlier publication Leibinz stole some of the glory that could have
been yours in inventing the Calculus.

Sorry for the diversion.. how about an example for the discussion
using someone who actually benefitted from intellectual property law?

Cheers - shevek

On 24 Apr 2006 13:43:24 -0700, wrote:

Jim Thompson wrote:

Music, poetry, computer programs, and using certain substances to
prevent bacterial infection. All were doing quite well, even before
the became elgible for synthetic property status via legal monopolies.
To assume that they could only exist under this status is to ignorantly
ignore the fact that they existed without it.

Stop talking generalities and cite a specific example.

Beowulf

Beowulf what? A book about Beowulf?

No the quasi-poetic story itself. A creative work long preceding the
concept of copyright, raised as a counter to the ignorant assumption
that our lives would be devoid of such richness in a world without the
concept of copyrights.

---
You seem to think that we still live in that time. We don't. Fast
forward about a thousand years into the future from then and it
becomes apparent that the need for copyright has come about
precisely because of the need for artists to be protected from the
wolves who would otherwise prey upon them.

Wolves like you, for instance, who think it's your God-given right
to copy anyone's works and disseminate them in any way you see fit,
under the pretense that by so doing you enrich our lives.

In fact, all you're really interested in being able to do is graze,
free range, on what's out there for your own benfit. That kind of
attitude and behavior can only contribute to the theft of resources
from the artist, quite conceivably lowering his output and
diminishing any enrichment our lives might attain from that source.

Other than the Nazi aspect of it, I don't understand what it is with
people like you who think it's OK to take other people's work and
deal with it as if it were your own, but I'm sure that if the shoe
was on the other foot and you had anything worth protecting, you and
your ilk would be the first to cry wolf.

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

On 24 Apr 2006 13:51:50 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:

Well, sometimes it takes a while before we can figure out what
something should be called, but the fact remains that if someone
thinks up a way to do something it was _their_ intellect which
allowed them to do it, so that means that the intellectual property
(which is the way to do it) belongs to them.

Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing as
granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual property.

---
The point you seem to be incapable of understanding is that granting
them ownership isn't necessary. The fact that the idea was theirs
in the first place makes them inherently the owner of the idea and
whether they choose to develop that idea commercially themselves or
license someone else to do it is none of your business.

Why do you think we say, without even thinking about it, "That was
my idea", or "That was her idea"?

It's because it's so obvious it doesn't need explaining.

Except, perhaps, to you.

Same like with kids. We don't need anyone to to tell us they're
ours, they just are.

In the same vein, your tacit assumption that those who originated
the idea need to be granted the right to _use_ the idea smacks of
that you think you should be in control of what they do with what's
theirs.

Not a pretty picture.

Say I get an idea about writing a poem which makes you look like a
Nazi, since you do.

According to your rules, prior to publishing it here I'd have to
send it by you for approval and unless it was couched in terms which
you considered to be innocuous (that wouldn't be too hard to do, I
think) it would never see the light of day.

Who needs that kind of crap?

None of us.
---

let's do a little thought experiment, OK? See if you can keep up...

Let's say that my name is Isaac Newton and that I've come up with a
way to describe, in exquisite detail, the motions of the planets
around the sun, but I don't tell anyone how it works, I just sell
them the data.

Data? From what input? For what purpose?

---
It doesn't matter.

The point is that it was _my_ method which yielded the data, and
using _my_ method I can demonstrate that I can predict the future.

It's easy. I'll tell you where your anus will be one year from
today, today, and if you go and look for it a year from now and it's
precisely where I said it would be you'll know I was right.

Still, It's _my_ method. I own it, and unless I choose to share it,
for whatever reason, it will go with me to the grave.
---

The irony of course is that calculus would not be protectable even if
first discovered today.

---
That's ridiculous. The secret is to not disclose.
---

Since I'm the one who invented the method and I'm the only one who
knows how to make it work, who would you say the method (and the
data, BTW) belonged to, before I sold it? To you?

Neither mathematical method nor data are protectable even today. Yet
there are lots of advances ongoing there as well...

---
As always, ignorance is the best posture to assume.

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 17:27:39 -0500, John Fields wrote:

It's easy. I'll tell you where your anus will be one year from
today, today, and if you go and look for it a year from now and it's
precisely where I said it would be you'll know I was right.

Still, It's _my_ method. I own it, and unless I choose to share it,
for whatever reason, it will go with me to the grave.

Ah, but if I can make the same prediction, using my own method, even
if the method duplicates your own, if you haven't disclosed it, then
it's mine as well, wouldn't you say? Which is why they have all these
copyright laws and what-not?

As a matter of fact, I have a real-life story about something very much
like this. It was one of the semi-finals or finals in some foo-foo college
class, and there was a big flap that someone had cheated because these two
students' answer sheets were so similar. After investigating, they
couldn't find any evidence that either had cheated - this was a lecture
class of about 300, and they were essentially sitting in opposite corners
of the auditorium - they just, coincidentally, happened to come up with
exactly the same answers. I think the thing that made the authorities so
suspicious was that it was an essay test. =:-O

But, whoever gets it to market first wins, right? ;-)

(BTW, I can also predict the position of people's ani, barring disaster
(pun initially unintended, but I'm leaving it in. %-D )

Thanks!
Rich

On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 13:30:53 -0700, Jim Thompson wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 13:26:26 -0700, wrote:
Jim Thompson wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 13:21:42 -0700, wrote:

Music, poetry, computer programs, and using certain substances to
prevent bacterial infection. All were doing quite well, even before
the became elgible for synthetic property status via legal monopolies.
To assume that they could only exist under this status is to ignorantly
ignore the fact that they existed without it.

Huh? Sounds like double-talk to me. Anything know to the public
beforehand CAN NOT be patented or copyrighted.

Stop talking generalities and cite a specific example.

Beowulf

Beowulf what? A book about Beowulf?

You're being vague and ignorant again... you are about to become
amongst those of the great ignored ;-)

...Jim Thompson

I think what cs_posting is trying to say is that there have been people
making stuff up for thousands of years, and nobody ever had to make up
an artificial category of "intellectual property" in order to get paid,
until quite recently.

That's probably true, if you're looking at cave-man days. But then
God created Thieves. The rest of the story I leave as an intellectual
exercise for the reader. ;-)

Cheers!
Rich

On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 16:34:17 -0500, John Fields wrote:

Other than the Nazi aspect of it, I don't understand what it is with
people like you who think it's OK to take other people's work and
deal with it as if it were your own, but I'm sure that if the shoe
was on the other foot and you had anything worth protecting, you and
your ilk would be the first to cry wolf.

It's the entitlement attitude, that got engendered when the government
started getting into the nanny business.

Thanks,
Rich

John Fields wrote:
Other than the Nazi aspect of it,

thievery = nazism?
hmmmm....

I don't understand what it is with people like you who
think it's OK to take other people's work and
deal with it as if it were your own,

I'd say that the desire for a free lunch is basic instinct,
right behind self-preservation and sex.

The fact that there is no free lunch (but plenty of
plunderable lunches) is attributable to the second law
of thermodynamics. I find it interesting, that people
rarely link the laws of nature to human morality.

but I'm sure that if the shoe
was on the other foot and you had anything worth protecting, you and
your ilk would be the first to cry wolf.

Of course.
Consistency and ethics are inconveniences, obstacles
to the free lunch.

Mark

wrote:
John Fields wrote:

In the same vein, your tacit assumption that those who originated
the idea need to be granted the right to _use_ the idea smacks of
that you think you should be in control of what they do with what's
theirs.

In John's dictionary, the word "tacit" is apparently defined as
"neither present nor even hinted at in the post I'm replying to"

I'm really curious where you came up with this idea that I was arguing
anything along the lines of "those who originated the idea need to be
granted the right to _use_ the idea"
That's your invention, not mine.

Ah, I think I've figured it out. John is unable to comprehend the
possibility of a system in which ideas are not ownable or treatable as
virtual property. As a result, when I suggested that recognizing an
inventor need not include granting them the right to use the invention
as virtual property, he translated the rules of the ideas-as-property
system to erroneously conlude that the inventor would not be allowed to
make _practical use_ of the idea. Wheras the opposite is true - if
ideas are not ownable property, then anyone can make use of them.

Since there's been a lot of jumping to conclusions, I feel the need to
point out that I have not recommended a switch to such a system. What
I have done is tried to point out that ideas as virtual property is a
recent construct and not the only possibility - to the practical end of
reminding everyone that these conventions are open to debate, and while
they are unlikely to be abandoned, they are certain to be modified over
time.

wrote:

Of course not - which is exactly the point. It's an example of a
creation that managed to get created even in John Field's supposedly
dull and monochrome world without intellectual property.

And it is indeed interesting to see that 'intellectual property' is not
absolute. Actually there are different kinds like trade marks, patents,
copyrights, and so on.

Which leads to the observation that there exist "intellectual things"
which currently can not be owned. Things invented before is supposed to
be one; trivial things another.

There must be a reason the ownership of this 'property' is not absolute.

And oh yes: please talk about the kind of ownership. "Intellectual
property" as a term is very vague and a sign of lawyer-speak. "Gazweezmo
version 6 is our 'intellectual property'" - yes, what about it is? The
name? The copyright on the packaging? The copyright on the code? A
patent on any oinvention that's inside?

By using the vague term, lawyers try to use the law they like best to
apply to the whole - probably even to the product idea (like Philips'
great 'you can't zap away from the commercials' invention).


Thomas

wrote:
wrote:
John Fields wrote:
[snip]

Ah, I think I've figured it out. John is unable to comprehend the
possibility of a system in which ideas are not ownable or treatable as
virtual property. As a result, when I suggested that recognizing an
inventor need not include granting them the right to use the invention
as virtual property, he translated the rules of the ideas-as-property
system to erroneously conlude that the inventor would not be allowed to
make _practical use_ of the idea. Wheras the opposite is true - if
ideas are not ownable property, then anyone can make use of them.

Since there's been a lot of jumping to conclusions, I feel the need to
point out that I have not recommended a switch to such a system. What
I have done is tried to point out that ideas as virtual property is a
recent construct and not the only possibility - to the practical end of
reminding everyone that these conventions are open to debate, and while
they are unlikely to be abandoned, they are certain to be modified over
time.

Thanks for your help on this issue CS. I will go out on a limb still
further, and say that a switch to such a system looks likely and
beneficial. More and more these questions are being brought up in
mainstream press, e.g.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/10/...n/edsmiers.php

http://www.ifla.org/documents/infopo...ht/ipmyths.htm

Two factors that I see leading to a paradigm shift on this issue:

1) Communication technology. As people are better able to communicate,
those who would try to prevent communication to maintain an IP monopoly
are left with little recourse but to model their business plans in a
more capitalisitic fashion. Unenforceable legislation is doomed.

2) Corruption. As IP laws have grown and changed, the corruption has
also grown. Now, it is easier to see the problem because people are
using the system in more and more detrimental ways. Nobody minds too
much if e.g. publishers can skim a little more profit, but when
corporations don't let you re-plant your seeds or claim to own your
DNA, and when certain prime numbers are illegal, it's clear something
is wrong.

Cheers - shevek

wrote in message
ups.com...

Neither mathematical method nor data are protectable even today.

Unless it is instantiated in a computer program.

wrote in message
oups.com...
John Fields wrote:

Other than the Nazi aspect of it, I don't understand what it is with
people like you who think it's OK to take other people's work and
deal with it as if it were your own, but I'm sure that if the shoe
was on the other foot and you had anything worth protecting, you and
your ilk would be the first to cry wolf.

Fourth mistake: triggering Godwin to try to end an argument you realize
you're loosing...

What do you mean by "triggering Godwin"?

Godwin's Law: "As an online discussion grows longer, the proability of a
comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."

Wher's the trigger?

wrote:

2) Corruption. As IP laws have grown and changed, the corruption has
also grown. Now, it is easier to see the problem because people are
using the system in more and more detrimental ways. Nobody minds too
much if e.g. publishers can skim a little more profit, but when
corporations don't let you re-plant your seeds or claim to own your
DNA, and when certain prime numbers are illegal, it's clear something
is wrong.


Re-plant your seeds? How the hell do you do that? The seed becomes
the plant. The seeds from those plants are not the same as the seed
that grew them because they were grown from a hybrid seed. If you use
seeds from those plants you will not get the same quality from the next
generation. They revert to one of the varieties that comprised the
hybrid, all of which are smaller and less hardy.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

Michael A. Terrell wrote:

Re-plant your seeds? How the hell do you do that? The seed becomes
the plant. The seeds from those plants are not the same as the seed
that grew them because they were grown from a hybrid seed. If you use
seeds from those plants you will not get the same quality from the next
generation. They revert to one of the varieties that comprised the
hybrid, all of which are smaller and less hardy.

Sometimes this hybrid issue is a natural result of trying to include
positive end-user charactersitics.

But sometimes it's an artifical issue introduced merely to prevent
replanting part of last year's harvest. Google "terminator gene"

And sometimes it's purely a legal "virtual property" issue - ie,
biologically possible to replant from the previous year's harvest, but
legally prohibited - and enforced typically be seed company inspectors
driving around checking unlicensed fields for plants with a proprietary
characteristic, such as herbicide resistance.

On 24 Apr 2006 14:05:09 -0700, wrote:


John Fields wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 13:06:21 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:

You don't know what you're talking about and, in fact, without
intellectual property our lives would be pretty boring. Just think,
no music, no poetry, no computer programs... Also, no antibiotics.
Wanna go back to that kind of a life?

I don't, and I'm no longer interested in this dialogue.

Rather ignorant assumptions you are making, considering that all of
your examples were well established traditions BEFORE the became
considered ownable "intellectual property"

---
Well, sometimes it takes a while before we can figure out what
something should be called, but the fact remains that if someone
thinks up a way to do something it was _their_ intellect which
allowed them to do it, so that means that the intellectual property
(which is the way to do it) belongs to them.

Yes, as it consists of only a neural arrangment in their head. Or
perhaps a collection of notes in their possession, symbolic
information, or perhaps in binary form on a hard drive. Any theft of
these objects is a clear violoation of your rights. Especially the
head.

Once others have seen or recorded this information, they now also
possess copies of that information. If you don't want anyone to know,
you'd better be careful who you tell.

---
And there's the crux of the matter.

Say I write a poem which strikes a chord in me and which I'd like
others to enjoy, and I publish it with a formal copyright notice
attached.

My intent is, clearly, since I published it with a note asking
everyone who reads it not to copy it and disseminate it without my
permission, to make some money off of it.

You seem to think that there's something wrong with that.

I'd like to know why.
---

let's do a little thought experiment, OK? See if you can keep up...

Let's say that my name is Isaac Newton and that I've come up with a
way to describe, in exquisite detail, the motions of the planets
around the sun, but I don't tell anyone how it works, I just sell
them the data.

Since I'm the one who invented the method and I'm the only one who
knows how to make it work, who would you say the method (and the
data, BTW) belonged to, before I sold it? To you?

To someone else?

Who?


Johannes Kepler

---
Yes, you're right, That's where the incontrovertible observational
data came from.
---

Or maybe some other giants who's shoulders you've stood upon.

---
Wrong attribution.
---

Now that you've told me you have such an idea Isaac, I would be
curious. Probably not much commercial application however.

---
Hmm... I don't know.

Have you ever considered widening the streets of London and charging
for decrease of traverse time around the curves?
---

Have you tried to write or sell your idea as a proposal to some religious or
academic bigwigs? Perhaps you'd best publish it openly in a concise
form and you'll have any academic job offer you'd like and more. As
for your ideas about calculus, you should have published them openly
much earlier.

---
Hindsight's 20-20, (I got that in a dream somewhere) and I disagree
with how you think I should have handled my affairs. You have no
idea as to the difficulties I had with the Calculus and, as an
outsider, you have no insight as to the difficulties I had had with
my life during that time.
---

Sure, you still obtained fame and fortune, but with his
earlier publication Leibinz stole some of the glory that could have
been yours in inventing the Calculus.

---
He was an honorable man and didn't steal anything from me.

We both happened on the same thing at about the same time.

Sorry for the diversion.. how about an example for the discussion
using someone who actually benefitted from intellectual property law?

---
Me. US Patent 4937519.

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

On 24 Apr 2006 13:21:42 -0700, wrote:


Music, poetry, computer programs, and using certain substances to
prevent bacterial infection. All were doing quite well, even before
the became elgible for synthetic property status via legal monopolies.
To assume that they could only exist under this status is to ignorantly
ignore the fact that they existed without it.

That's absurd, and is tantamount to saying that writing would have
been impossible before the invention of the typewriter.


--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

Richard Henry wrote:
wrote in message
ups.com...

Neither mathematical method nor data are protectable even today.

Unless it is instantiated in a computer program.

Conflicts like that can usually only exist while a system is in
transition...

On 24 Apr 2006 14:43:33 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:

Beowulf

You seem to think that we still live in that time. We don't. Fast
forward about a thousand years into the future from then and it
becomes apparent that the need for copyright has come about
precisely because of the need for artists to be protected from the
wolves who would otherwise prey upon them.

I assume by wolves, you mean record companies?

---
No, pirates.

Artists enter into deals with record companies. The deals may not
be to the advantage of the artists, but that's just the result of
the artist's ineptitude at business.
---

You're first mistake is to assume that the way things have turned out
is the only positive path of development that could have occured.

---
It's not "you're" it's "your", and why would you assume that?

The fact that I support patenting and trademarking give you no
information whatever about my thoughts as to the possibility of
alternate development paths existing.
---

Wolves like you, for instance, who think it's your God-given right
to copy anyone's works and disseminate them in any way you see fit,
under the pretense that by so doing you enrich our lives.

Your second mistake it putting words in my mouth. How do you know my
views?

---
You're mistaken, again.
I haven't put words in your mouth, I've made clear what kind of
person I think you are.
---

I haven't actually expressed any - I merely pointed out counterexamples
to your argument.

---
That's not true. Your:

"Rather ignorant assumptions you are making, considering that all of
your examples were well established traditions BEFORE the became
considered ownable "intellectual property" "

sounds to me like your view, at that particular point in time, was
that I had made an ignorant assumption.
---

In fact, all you're really interested in being able to do is graze,
free range, on what's out there for your own benfit. That kind of
attitude and behavior can only contribute to the theft of resources
from the artist, quite conceivably lowering his output and
diminishing any enrichment our lives might attain from that source.

Third mistake: continuing off on a tangent

---
LOL, everything's a mistake when it doesn't go exactly like you want
it to, isn't it?
---

Other than the Nazi aspect of it, I don't understand what it is with
people like you who think it's OK to take other people's work and
deal with it as if it were your own, but I'm sure that if the shoe
was on the other foot and you had anything worth protecting, you and
your ilk would be the first to cry wolf.


Fourth mistake: triggering Godwin to try to end an argument you realize
you're loosing...

---
Another error. I'm not trying to end anything, I'm loosing an
argument on you which you can't seem to cope with and keep whining
"mistake" instead of countering logically. In this instance, _you_
were the one, not I, who cited Godwin in an attempt to stop the
argument instead of offering proof that your attitude isn't
Nazi-like.
---

Fifth mistake: assuming the present status quo will persist.

---
What makes you think I assume that?
---

For software and music recording it clearly won't. In the case of
software, because the industry is rapidly outgrowing traditional
publisher/monopoly concepts of copyright. In the case of music
recordings, because copyright is so divorced from it's alleged purpose
that an increasing segment of the public would no longer support the
law if it were put to referendum. That doesn't mean that the
alternative to the present system is no system; but it does mean that
thiings will continue to change.

---
Platitudes and opinions. Blah, blah, blah...


--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

John Fields wrote:

Wolves like you, for instance, who think it's your God-given right
to copy anyone's works and disseminate them in any way you see fit,
under the pretense that by so doing you enrich our lives.

Your second mistake it putting words in my mouth. How do you know my
views?
---
You're mistaken, again.
I haven't put words in your mouth, I've made clear what kind of
person I think you are.

Which is exactly my point - you are arguing against your unfounded
assumptions of my views, rather than against the substance of what i've
actually said.

In fact you don't seem to have challenged the substance at all yet.

I haven't actually expressed any - I merely pointed out counterexamples
to your argument.

---
That's not true. Your:

"Rather ignorant assumptions you are making, considering that all of
your examples were well established traditions BEFORE the became
considered ownable "intellectual property" "

sounds to me like your view, at that particular point in time, was
that I had made an ignorant assumption.

Yes, because you ignored obvious counterexamples to your suggestion
that certain types of intellectual property would not exist without
protection; the counterexamples being that they were established fields
of practice before they were protectable.

On 24 Apr 2006 21:24:00 -0700, wrote:

wrote:
John Fields wrote:

In the same vein, your tacit assumption that those who originated
the idea need to be granted the right to _use_ the idea smacks of
that you think you should be in control of what they do with what's
theirs.

In John's dictionary, the word "tacit" is apparently defined as
"neither present nor even hinted at in the post I'm replying to"

I'm really curious where you came up with this idea that I was arguing
anything along the lines of "those who originated the idea need to be
granted the right to _use_ the idea"
That's your invention, not mine.

Ah, I think I've figured it out.

---
Finally?
---

John is unable to comprehend the possibility of a system in which ideas
are not ownable or treatable as virtual property.

---
Well, that's not even remotely correct, so that can't be why you
think you've figured it out, even though you might think you have.
---

As a result, when I suggested that recognizing an
inventor need not include granting them the right to use the invention
as virtual property, he translated the rules of the ideas-as-property
system to erroneously conlude that the inventor would not be allowed to
make _practical use_ of the idea.

---
You just blather on with no thought at all behind it and hope for
the best, don't you?

The fact is, you've done yourself in twice and you don't even know
it. Here's the original:

"Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing
as granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual
property."

And here's its second even more heinous incarnation, from above:

"recognizing an inventor need not include granting them the right to
use the invention"

So, if I invent something under your system, it's not inherently
mine and I don't inherently have the right to use it?

You don't think that stinks?
---

Wheras the opposite is true - if
ideas are not ownable property, then anyone can make use of them.

---
But ideas _are_ ownable property. Take, for example, trade secrets.
---

Since there's been a lot of jumping to conclusions, I feel the need to
point out that I have not recommended a switch to such a system. What
I have done is tried to point out that ideas as virtual property is a
recent construct and not the only possibility - to the practical end of
reminding everyone that these conventions are open to debate, and while
they are unlikely to be abandoned, they are certain to be modified over
time.

---
Instead of just blathering on ad nauseam with platitudes and
generalities, why don't you tell us where you _do_ stand?

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

John Fields wrote:
The fact is, you've done yourself in twice and you don't even know
it. Here's the original:

"Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing
as granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual
property."

And here's its second even more heinous incarnation, from above:

"recognizing an inventor need not include granting them the right to
use the invention"

That's your statement not mine!

Why do you keep constructing outrageous straw men to argue against?

Wheras the opposite is true - if
ideas are not ownable property, then anyone can make use of them.

But ideas _are_ ownable property. Take, for example, trade secrets.

Only in some systems are ideas ownable property. Apparently you aren't
able to think in the context of systems where they are not, long
enough to form sensible conclusions about how things would work in
those systems.

Instead of just blathering on ad nauseam with platitudes and
generalities, why don't you tell us where you _do_ stand?

"Ideas as virtual propety" is an artificial enough concept that while
it has substantial merit, it cannot be applied without constantly
keeping in mind the fact that it's an artifical creation subject to
compromise, not a mandatory state of affairs. You cannot blindly apply
physical property concepts to virtual property, because the
"property-ness" of virtual property is limited by the compromise that
grants it status as proprety. (some would say that the ownability of
physical property is also a compromise - which is true - but it's a
much less precarious one than that of virtual property)

wrote:
John Fields wrote:
The fact is, you've done yourself in twice and you don't even know
it. Here's the original:

"Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing
as granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual
property."

And here's its second even more heinous incarnation, from above:

"recognizing an inventor need not include granting them the right to
use the invention"

That's your statement not mine!

Specifically, by dropping the "as virtual property" from my original,
John constructed a new statement with a nearly opposite meaning of the
original, then fradulently attributed his new statement to me so that
he could argue against an outrageous straw man, rather than the
reasoned arguments I actually presented.

On 25 Apr 2006 09:00:56 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:
The fact is, you've done yourself in twice and you don't even know
it. Here's the original:

"Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing
as granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual
property."

And here's its second even more heinous incarnation, from above:

"recognizing an inventor need not include granting them the right to
use the invention"

That's your statement not mine!

---
No, it's not. Go back and read my last post again.
---

Why do you keep constructing outrageous straw men to argue against?

---
I don't.
---


Wheras the opposite is true - if
ideas are not ownable property, then anyone can make use of them.

But ideas _are_ ownable property. Take, for example, trade secrets.

Only in some systems are ideas ownable property.

---
That's ridiculous. In any system, until an idea is divulged, to
whom do you think it belongs?
---

Apparently you aren't
able to think in the context of systems where they are not, long
enough to form sensible conclusions about how things would work in
those systems.

---
"From each according to their capabilities, to each according to
their needs?" We _all_ know how well _that_ works, don't we?
---


Instead of just blathering on ad nauseam with platitudes and
generalities, why don't you tell us where you _do_ stand?

"Ideas as virtual propety" is an artificial enough concept that while
it has substantial merit, it cannot be applied without constantly
keeping in mind the fact that it's an artifical creation subject to
compromise, not a mandatory state of affairs. You cannot blindly apply
physical property concepts to virtual property, because the
"property-ness" of virtual property is limited by the compromise that
grants it status as proprety. (some would say that the ownability of
physical property is also a compromise - which is true - but it's a
much less precarious one than that of virtual property)

---
More clap-trap.

Again, I'll ask: Instead of just blathering on ad nauseam with
platitudes and generalities, why don't you tell us where you _do_
stand?


--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

On 25 Apr 2006 09:05:45 -0700, wrote:

wrote:
John Fields wrote:
The fact is, you've done yourself in twice and you don't even know
it. Here's the original:

"Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing
as granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual
property."

And here's its second even more heinous incarnation, from above:

"recognizing an inventor need not include granting them the right to
use the invention"

That's your statement not mine!

Specifically, by dropping the "as virtual property" from my original,
John constructed a new statement with a nearly opposite meaning of the
original, then fradulently attributed his new statement to me so that
he could argue against an outrageous straw man, rather than the
reasoned arguments I actually presented.

---
I misread your second statement and trimmed it for convenience. I
apologize for that.

However, my position is still that the idea is inherently the
property of its originator, who should be free to do with it what he
chooses. Give it away, sell it, rent it, whatever.

Your position (if you'll admit to having one) seems to be that the
idea doesn't belong to its originator, but to some sort of
collective with the power to determine who owns the idea and how
it'll be used.

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

Jasen Betts wrote:


That's ridiculous. It _is_ theft, and that's why the laws are in
place; to deal with the crime when it's committed.
---

not by any legal definition ("dishonest apropriation of another's property
with the intent to deprive him of it permanently"), and it's not a crime
in the free world.

It's a civil matter between the holder and the infringer

1. Copyright infringement is in the criminal codes in most countries in
the world, laws were unified recently to ease world trade.

2. Theft too is a civil matter between thieve and victim, not only a
criminal one between thieve and the people. Any crime comitted gives the
victim a right to compensation against the criminal, at least in theory.
Whether or not that right can be enforced in practice is a different
matter.

Zak wrote:

As far as the level of inventions: a recent application was for a TV
that disallows chaning channels while in a commercial. It IS new, I
agree, but is it a technical invention, or merely so stupid as not to
have been published before? Still it may bit someone someday whenever
teh principle is applied to something useful.

Novelty is not the only criterion. It has to boil down to technology and
it must be a significant step (and the latter I doubt very much in your
example).

In addition there are a couple of restrictions like that an invention
must not be immoral. And something that restricts peoples freedom may
very well be considered immoral.

As I said before, patent protection itself is a good idea, but its
practical application has degraded badly in the last 20 years or so.

wrote:



I suggest
that instead of considering the difference as far as a copyright is
concerned, you think of it in terms of a patent where, when a patent
expires, the invention passes into the public domain. When that
happens all the prior restrictions encumbering its use fall away and
it becomes freely available to the public to use in any way it sees
fit.

Of course in reality, the idea is available to the public as soon as
they see it. The only problem is, the patent law forbids them from
using it for innovation, business, health, scientific research, etc.

No, the whole purpose of patent law is to make ideas available for
research and innovation as soon as possible. Lets consider the
alternative: Somebody has a bright idea for some new process. If there
were no patent laws, he would keep it secret, and others could not use
it or improve on it. For a patent, you have to disclose the idea, so
that any competent person in the field can use it. In return, you
receive royalties from anybody making _commercial_ use of your idea.

In an ideal world at least this protects the interest of both the public
(technical and scientific progress is available as soon as possible) and
the inventer to obtain the just rewards for it.

That patents, especially in the software industry, have become an
obstacle rather than a catalyst for progress has to do with the wrong
application of patent law, especially in the US:
- Patents are awarded on things that were, for good reason, excluded
from patentability (algorithm, discoveries).
- Patents are unjustifiably broad, covering things later invented by
others.
- Patens are awarded despite prior art.


Of necessity, any invention or copyrighted work intended for public
dissemination _has_ to be presented for sale to the public, but that
doesn't mean that the author's or inventor's exclusive rights to the
works are abridged in any way.

You may want "exclusive rights" to some information, but the reality is
that once somebody else knows that information you no longer are the
exclusive holder of the information.

If somebody copies my software, I dont lose my copy.

---
But you _do_ lose the income which was rightfully yours had they
bought the software instead of copying/stealing it.
---

Rightfully yours my ass. Unless you are referring to your right to pay
an armed group to ensure a monopoly enterprise.

No. Wealth can be generated only by work, that is a fundamental rule of
macroeconomics. If I write software, or if I make an invention, or if I
create a work of art, my work goes into the creation of something new.
Is it not fair then that I should be the one who profits from the wealth
created?

If, say, a blacksmith turns a piece of iron into a horse-shoe, he uses
work to transform an object into something more usable, that is more
valuable. When he turns over that horseshoe to a rider, he gets paid for
his trouble. Even if the rider gave the smith the piece of iron to work
with, the smith still has the right to payment for his work.

In the same way a software author has the right to earn a living from
the work of his hands (or brain, as the case may be). That it is
technically _easy_ to take that income away from him doesn't make it
morally _right_. And so we have laws to protect us from those who want
to take away from us the fruits of our labour, laws against physical
theft as well as against the theft of intellectual property.

Of course it is the right of anyone to donate his work, by working for a
charity for example or by making software available under a free licence
(e.g. GPL). But that they do under their own free will, they should not
be forced to do it (that's called communism) nor should others be
allowed to just take it away (that's called theft).

It is very, very, *very* different to stealing a physical object from
someone.

As you can see from the above, it is basically a similar thing,
differences in detail (and in the applicable law) none-withstanding.

On 25 Apr 2006 10:33:31 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 13:21:42 -0700, wrote:

Music, poetry, computer programs, and using certain substances to
prevent bacterial infection. All were doing quite well, even before
the became elgible for synthetic property status via legal monopolies.
To assume that they could only exist under this status is to ignorantly
ignore the fact that they existed without it.

That's absurd, and is tantamount to saying that writing would have
been impossible before the invention of the typewriter.

You've just argued cs_posting's point (that external items -- IP,
typewriters -- are not a requirement for art, etc to be produced).

---
I disagree.

Art _can't_ be produced without external items, but that wasn't
cs_posting's point. What he was trying to do was to ridicule me by
implying that I couln't understand a relationship as blatantly
obvious as the one I illustrated.

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

On Mon, 24 Apr 2006 09:17:42 -0700, shevek4 wrote:
Jim Thompson wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 08:47:12 -0700, wrote:
Jim Thompson wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 06:29:21 -0700, wrote:

[snip]d operates?

The operation of the "real world" is really quite simple... personal
property rights... something you ne'er-do-well socialists have trouble
comprehending... you seem to think everything should be "yours"
without any effort on your part.

My apologies. I thought you'd been reading the thread. My devil's
advocate position here only discusses only so-called intellectual
property. Even though I do like to practice arguing from difficult
positions, I'm not going to argue against personal property rights
here.

The difference is very clear: personal property is baryonic matter.
It's not exactly clear what intellectual property is, but it doesn't
contain protons.

Perhaps that's understandable even for your ne'er-do-well socialists?


So, you're saying that ideas don't exist? Consciousness doesn't exist?
You don't exist?

Thanks,
Rich

Rich Grise wrote:

So, you're saying that ideas don't exist? Consciousness doesn't exist?
You don't exist?


No, just that you don't exist! ;-)


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

On 25 Apr 2006 05:41:27 -0700, wrote:


Thanks for your help on this issue CS. I will go out on a limb still
further, and say that a switch to such a system looks likely and
beneficial. More and more these questions are being brought up in
mainstream press, e.g.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/10/...n/edsmiers.php

http://www.ifla.org/documents/infopo...ht/ipmyths.htm

---
The mainstream press???

LOL,

You cite a badly thought out and unimplementable plan by an
obviously socialist publicist, and a set of opinions decrying the
protection of intellectual property with an avenue provided for
dissemination, but with no avenue provided for disagreement.

Yeah, that's the kind of **** I can get behind...
---

Two factors that I see leading to a paradigm shift on this issue:

1) Communication technology. As people are better able to communicate,
those who would try to prevent communication to maintain an IP monopoly
are left with little recourse but to model their business plans in a
more capitalisitic fashion. Unenforceable legislation is doomed.

---
Tricky. You spout a lot of **** and then end it with a sentence
which is true, making it seem like what went before must also,
therefore, be true.
---

2) Corruption. As IP laws have grown and changed, the corruption has
also grown. Now, it is easier to see the problem because people are
using the system in more and more detrimental ways. Nobody minds too
much if e.g. publishers can skim a little more profit, but when
corporations don't let you re-plant your seeds or claim to own your
DNA, and when certain prime numbers are illegal, it's clear something
is wrong.

---
What's wrong is that people like you report not the unvarnished
truth, but just enough of the truth with enough of the details
obscured to suit your cause.

For example, let's look at the issue of genetically engineered
high-yield corn.

It's not like the formula for it came with no effort expended and,
once it was developed, the deals made regarding its cultivation were
unilateral.

Basically, it's buy the seed, plant it, and sell (say) three times
what you could with the old seed corn, but if you want to use the
new seed you have to agree to buy it every time you plant a new crop
instead of saving some of the harvest to use as seed corn.

If you don't want to agree to the deal, then don't.

But if you do, and you raise a second crop with seeds which you
agreed not to plant, then you're clearly in violation of the
contract.

--
John Fields
Professional Circuit Designer

On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 21:09:52 +0000, Michael A. Terrell wrote:
Rich Grise wrote:

So, you're saying that ideas don't exist? Consciousness doesn't exist?
You don't exist?

No, just that you don't exist! ;-)

Well, I know I exist, because I can feel me.

I know the St. Louis Gateway Arch exists, because I've been up it. (well,
that doesn't guarantee that it _still_ exists, but physical matter pretty
much stays put per Newton). And so on.

I'm pretty sure _you_ exist, at least on some level of reality, because if
you were imaginary, you wouldn't constantly be bitching about your aches
and pains. Have you ever tried feeling into your pains to ask them what
their message for your spirit is?

There might be some ideas you could look into he
http://www.godchannel.com/4steps.html

Good Luck!
Rich

"," wrote:

On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 21:09:52 +0000, Michael A. Terrell wrote:
Rich Grise wrote:

So, you're saying that ideas don't exist? Consciousness doesn't exist?
You don't exist?

No, just that you don't exist! ;-)

Well, I know I exist, because I can feel me.

I know the St. Louis Gateway Arch exists, because I've been up it. (well,
that doesn't guarantee that it _still_ exists, but physical matter pretty
much stays put per Newton). And so on.

I'm pretty sure _you_ exist, at least on some level of reality, because if
you were imaginary, you wouldn't constantly be bitching about your aches
and pains. Have you ever tried feeling into your pains to ask them what
their message for your spirit is?

There might be some ideas you could look into he
http://www.godchannel.com/4steps.html

Good Luck!
Rich


You would probably "feel the pain" if you weren't drunk all the time.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

John Fields wrote:
Instead of just blathering on ad nauseam with platitudes and
generalities, why don't you tell us where you _do_ stand?

"Ideas as virtual propety" is an artificial enough concept that while
it has substantial merit, it cannot be applied without constantly
keeping in mind the fact that it's an artifical creation subject to
compromise, not a mandatory state of affairs. You cannot blindly apply
physical property concepts to virtual property, because the
"property-ness" of virtual property is limited by the compromise that
grants it status as proprety. (some would say that the ownability of
physical property is also a compromise - which is true - but it's a
much less precarious one than that of virtual property)

---
More clap-trap.

Again, I'll ask: Instead of just blathering on ad nauseam with
platitudes and generalities, why don't you tell us where you _do_
stand?

Apparently John has a reading comprehension problem...

On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 21:09:52 +0000, Michael A. Terrell wrote:

Rich Grise wrote:

So, you're saying that ideas don't exist? Consciousness doesn't exist?
You don't exist?


No, just that you don't exist! ;-)

Grease doesn't exist? You cracked the code?

--
Keith

Keith wrote:

On Tue, 25 Apr 2006 21:09:52 +0000, Michael A. Terrell wrote:

Rich Grise wrote:

So, you're saying that ideas don't exist? Consciousness doesn't exist?
You don't exist?


No, just that you don't exist! ;-)

Grease doesn't exist? You cracked the code?

--
Keith


Its obvious, if you'll just look for the signs. ;-)


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

John Fields wrote:

Only in some systems are ideas ownable property.

That's ridiculous. In any system, until an idea is divulged, to
whom do you think it belongs?

I don't think it follows that the originator-"ownership" of an idea is
necessarily the same as ownership of a property interest in it (I am my
parents' child, but they do not own me).

However, the issue of non-disclosed ideas may touch on a possible
difference between the world today, and the world of the early
industrial revolution when property-concepts of IP were systematically
established. The grant of a patent as a reward for publishing a method
seems to reflect a fear that knowledge would remain secret - aquite
legitimate feat in that day and age.

Today however, the idea that knowledge will remain secret is almost
laughable. Techniques of analysis have advanced so far that any idea
used in commerce has a fair chance of getting "out of the bag"
regardless if a patent is filed or not. To a deteremined competitor,
simple evidence that something is possible is quite a shortcut - add in
an example of the result and it's only a matter of time and money to
reverse engineer the method.

So perhaps it's worth asking, if society is no longer concenred about
secret knowledge holding back the state of the art, is the original
'temporary owernship in return for publication' patent construct still
a good deal for the public? Or does the information age need to treat
IP differently than the industrial age did?

On 2006-04-24, John Fields wrote:
On 24 Apr 2006 13:51:50 -0700, wrote:

John Fields wrote:

Well, sometimes it takes a while before we can figure out what
something should be called, but the fact remains that if someone
thinks up a way to do something it was _their_ intellect which
allowed them to do it, so that means that the intellectual property
(which is the way to do it) belongs to them.

Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing as
granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual property.

---
The point you seem to be incapable of understanding is that granting
them ownership isn't necessary. The fact that the idea was theirs
in the first place makes them inherently the owner of the idea and
whether they choose to develop that idea commercially themselves or
license someone else to do it is none of your business.

Why do you think we say, without even thinking about it, "That was
my idea", or "That was her idea"?

It's because it's so obvious it doesn't need explaining.

why do you use the past tense? "was my idea".

is it because at some level you understand that by sharing it it is no
longer exclusively yours?

Bye.
Jasen

John Fields wrote:
On 25 Apr 2006 05:41:27 -0700, wrote:


Thanks for your help on this issue CS. I will go out on a limb still
further, and say that a switch to such a system looks likely and
beneficial. More and more these questions are being brought up in
mainstream press, e.g.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/10/...n/edsmiers.php

http://www.ifla.org/documents/infopo...ht/ipmyths.htm

---
The mainstream press???

LOL,

You cite a badly thought out and unimplementable plan by an
obviously socialist publicist, and a set of opinions decrying the
protection of intellectual property with an avenue provided for
dissemination, but with no avenue provided for disagreement.

Yeah, that's the kind of **** I can get behind...


In what way is a more free market "socialist" ?

What part about letting entrepeneurs use publicly available information
to create products for consumers is socialist?

If anything is socialist or communist about this issue, it is
government creation of a monopoly. Patents were originally
monarchistic - allowing those favored by the crown to control a market.

---

Two factors that I see leading to a paradigm shift on this issue:

1) Communication technology. As people are better able to communicate,
those who would try to prevent communication to maintain an IP monopoly
are left with little recourse but to model their business plans in a
more capitalisitic fashion. Unenforceable legislation is doomed.

---
Tricky. You spout a lot of **** and then end it with a sentence
which is true, making it seem like what went before must also,
therefore, be true.
---

2) Corruption. As IP laws have grown and changed, the corruption has
also grown. Now, it is easier to see the problem because people are
using the system in more and more detrimental ways. Nobody minds too
much if e.g. publishers can skim a little more profit, but when
corporations don't let you re-plant your seeds or claim to own your
DNA, and when certain prime numbers are illegal, it's clear something
is wrong.

---
What's wrong is that people like you report not the unvarnished
truth, but just enough of the truth with enough of the details
obscured to suit your cause.

For example, let's look at the issue of genetically engineered
high-yield corn.

It's not like the formula for it came with no effort expended and,
once it was developed, the deals made regarding its cultivation were
unilateral.

Basically, it's buy the seed, plant it, and sell (say) three times
what you could with the old seed corn, but if you want to use the
new seed you have to agree to buy it every time you plant a new crop
instead of saving some of the harvest to use as seed corn.

If you don't want to agree to the deal, then don't.


Unfortunately that's not an option under current intellectual property
law. You aren't asked if you want to agree to the deal; rather, you
are forced.

But if you do, and you raise a second crop with seeds which you
agreed not to plant, then you're clearly in violation of the
contract.


Yes, if you agreed to such a contract. Instead, people who haven't
agreed to such contracts are being shut down.

John Fields wrote:
On 25 Apr 2006 09:05:45 -0700, wrote:

wrote:
John Fields wrote:
The fact is, you've done yourself in twice and you don't even know
it. Here's the original:

"Recognizing the originator of an idea is not nearly the same thing
as granting them ownership of the idea or its use as virtual
property."

And here's its second even more heinous incarnation, from above:

"recognizing an inventor need not include granting them the right to
use the invention"

That's your statement not mine!

Specifically, by dropping the "as virtual property" from my original,
John constructed a new statement with a nearly opposite meaning of the
original, then fradulently attributed his new statement to me so that
he could argue against an outrageous straw man, rather than the
reasoned arguments I actually presented.

---
I misread your second statement and trimmed it for convenience. I
apologize for that.

However, my position is still that the idea is inherently the
property of its originator, who should be free to do with it what he
chooses. Give it away, sell it, rent it, whatever.

Your position (if you'll admit to having one) seems to be that the
idea doesn't belong to its originator, but to some sort of
collective with the power to determine who owns the idea and how
it'll be used.


Thanks John for your responses to these perhaps radical ideas.

One more comment:

Under IP laws, an idea does not belong to its originator, but belongs
to whoever is favored by (who has paid) the governors. The originator,
other people who came up with it (what idea has ever been had by only a
single person?), those who appreciate the work and would build on it,
and those who could use the idea to better the economy, are out of
luck, at least in the lands under power of the crown - I mean the
forementioned governernors.