How Intellectual Property Hampers Capitalism | Stephan Kinsella

Presented by Stephan Kinsella at the 2010 Mises Institute Supporters Summit: "The Economic Recovery: Washington's Big Lie." Recorded in Auburn, Alabama; 9 October 2010.

[@ocruadlaoic]

Once an idea leaves your mouth, it is no longer your property.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Well it is, but it's not protected. You just put it out into the public domain. That's why we have copyrights and patents. Right?

[@ocruadlaoic]

Donald Clifford copyrights and patents are what we are here to see abolished, hence the above video.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Copyrights and patents protect life, liberty and property. Are you a criminal?

[@ocruadlaoic]

Donald Clifford why are you here in this particular comment section, flapping your gums ? Have you watched the above content, you utter ignoramus?

[@donaldclifford5763]

Woo. Triggered. I learn a lot in these exchanges. Open your mind and you too will learn.

[@MrPisster]

This is a great presentation. Smart guy too. I'd like to hear more from him, like does he have a podcast?

[@thelz7909]

You probably found your answer years ago, but for those reading this now, he has one at: www.stephankinsella.com/

[@oddnejmus]

I'm drawn to this perspective for its honesty. It doesn't need copyright, laws, bureaucracy, state monopoly on violence, or a massive amount of money to uphold the above. If it's fraud, then people - being honest, and some of them actually intelligent - will call it for what it is: fraud. It happens on KZbin all the time. People taking credit for what they have not created are criticised and blacklisted. You can only survive as a free-rider for so long (in a system based on honesty).

[@ParodyVille]

That only works if everyone is playing by the same rules and standards....I just recently saw a video about an American KZbinr whose videos show hot to order Chinese knockoff Nike's, then go buy a true Nike, and go back and return the knockoff and you just got free money....Nike can't go after the Chinese knockoffs but they are going after the American KZbinr

[@operacarmen]

Since "patents" is a semitic industry .. it's extremely antisemitic to make patents and copyrights public. And this is the bottom line! This man needs to be arrested immediately!

[@mtanousable]

"It took hours to fix when it should have only taken minutes" is the cry of someone who never fixes their own computer issues. It depends on the issue, of course, but there are a lot of cases where Linux is easier to fix than Windows. Especially when it comes to enterprise use and computer hardware development.

[@JM-co6rf]

The question of monopoly is a red herring. You have a monopoly on your body, and that's a good thing. The real question is - can you use violence against others to prevent them from doing (insert action) with their own property. If I choose to arrange my atoms in a way that I saw you arrange those atoms, I'm not committing violence. BUT you enforcing your OPINION of how I should arrange my atoms you ARE committing violence (via the state) - - and thereby committing a FAR MORE egregious action than me.

[@silkeschumann7261]

If the name is unique and if the name actually is associated with this company by merely the company of two everyday words. If Joe average loves the burger from his near by diner and boasts the chef in this diner is a true burger king as a form of boasting. Because Joe average never grows tired to tell everybody that the little diner is a king when it comes to burger, you feel like a king so delicious is this burger. Soon there after the little diner is locally known as the king of burger, the burger king. Didn't the diner earn to use this name because of the excellency of his burger and because the people using the diner and heard of the diner actually associate the name. But because Burger King has a chain across country but in this small town the diner is not allowed to. Because a sports clothing company trademarked the word "champion" you cant print champion on the chest of T-shirts, despite the fact that the first thought that pops into every ones mind is the achievement in sports and not the producer of t-shirts. Trademarks aren't earned anymore. They are forced upon us and to an extend that amounts to sanctioned criminal extortion and censorship.

[@LesterBrunt]

BP 27 But how is it stealing if you take money that never belonged to that person? Isn’t that just called competition?

[@CarrotCakeMake]

No. Being the only person who can decide whether a certain pair of shoes is worn makes those shoes your property. Being the only person who is allowed to wear shoes is monopoly. They are 2 very different concepts. IP is monopoly, not property. You aren't the only person allowed to have a body, so your body isn't a "monopoly".

[@alexandreoliveira2756]

@@CarrotCakeMake hmmmm, interesting concept.

[@cpebud]

@BP 27 you are talking about stealing future profits. You don’t own your future profits, the consumer does.

[@rogereighty6463]

Once information is revealed to another, you no longer possess it.

[@stephendincher5688]

Information is not ownable anyway.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@stephendincher5688 Why not? What is fundamentally different from a non tangible commercial value from a tangible one? The value is what matters, not it's substrate.

[@dinch2]

@@donaldclifford5763 rivalrousness. My using the information does not prevent your using it. If you prevent me from using my resources to enact your idea, that's a negative servitude. It violates actual property rights to enforce the faux intellectual property "rights"

[@donaldclifford5763]

@@dinch2 Using my intellectual property for private personal use does not hurt me. Now if you misappropriate my intellectual asset for your commercial benefit, I am entitled to just compensation, seizure of stolen assets, and a requirement to cease and desist.

[@dinch2]

@@donaldclifford5763 nope. There is no such thing as "intellectual asset." It is not rivalrous. My use of it does you zero harm. But your using force to keep me from using my property as I see fit, even if it uses your idea, does cause me harm. It's called a "negative servitude" and it is a violation of my property rights.

[@bjarnet3]

This is incredible good!!! Amazing!!! Can't wait to share this...

[@lifeblood086]

Great lecture! I am tempted to take your course coming up.

[@skytrooper1980]

Stephen Kinsella fucking ROCKS! I love this guy and his way of thinking.

[@099749]

Thankyou for the presentation

[@mrsha007]

THIS SPEECH WAS BEAUTIFUL!

[@CurtHowland]

@lstdy You might be interested in "Against Intellectual Monopoly", just search for it, it's online gratis as one might expect.

[@UncleSiam]

Of the all the Free Market concepts, the issue of intellectual property is the toughest one for me to wrap my head around. If you have patents and intellectual property you essentially have created a government assisted monopoly. And yet, we could argue that if the intellectual property is not guarded, there would be less incentive for people to invest time and money into researching it, which would be counter productive and harm efficiency. Not to mention the researcher stands to lose time and money(property) as well. This would be where Minarchists will say the role of government is needed. There has to be some compromise. What if you still honored intellectual property but with certain limits. - Reduce the duration of monopoly----It must allow for the inventor to at least recuperate the time and money put into it and retain personal fame/reputation as the inventor/discoverer. -Others who can prove that they came up with the idea on their own thru their own research and not reverse engineering should be considered a partner to the patents. -Once it is out of the duration, it is no longer patent-able in the future. -Digital programs and schematics should be protected on the same level. This is the tough one because programs are easily copied as well as updated. I think this is covered under copyright laws. Am I overlooking anything? I'm sure I just described the system that we already have in place... except for maybe the sharing of the patent for late developers? Essentially the duration that the intellectual property remains a monopoly could be shortened. It is property if there are any resources tied into developing it. If the schematics are stolen, this denies the inventor access to the invention. If the schematics are copied/duplicated, the person who will then patent it must prove how he invested time and money into researching the IP. This is why Anarcho Capitalism isn't the best system and why the role of government (Minarchistic) is required.

[@nicholastidemann9384]

"And yet, we could argue that if the intellectual property is not guarded, there would be less incentive for people to invest time and money into researching it, which would be counter productive and harm efficiency. Not to mention the researcher stands to lose time and money (property) as well." Of course there would be less incentive. When the state forcibly takes property and gives it to you because you came up with something first or something similar, then obviously this is going to create a larger economic incentive for you to do it. The point is that this incentive comes at the cost of violence and other people's property. The same thing can be said for anything the state subsidizes. If the state didn't subsidize the production of food, of course there would be less incentive to produce food, ceteris paribus, but that doesn't mean that this is bad. When removing the state from these equations, you get a production of research and art (and similar) equal to the best possible reflection of the wants and needs of people, decided through what amount of the fruits of their labour they decide to spend on it, and the same goes for the production of food. Not only does the produced goods more accurately reflect consumer's wants, but you also do it without the coercion and violence of the state. Patents and intellectual property rights (at least in the sense that you are talking about them, and that the world is operating with today) are nothing more than subsidies for people coming up with ideas, and as soon as you view them as such, you will probably be less confused. All this is of course also the reason why we've always had steady production of arts and technology throughout history, no matter how many intellectual property rights were present. What you are saying when calling for the need for patents and such, is that you believe things like arts and research should be given a higher priority than what people would choose for themselves. This is the main problem of all central planning, as it is obvious that these resources must come at the expense of other things. This again is why a decentralized economy, where people get to spend their money on what they want, is by far the superior solution when it comes to the creation of prosperity and the minimization of conflict.

[@mikekrauss4367]

Nicholas Tidemann Very well said!

[@UncleSiam]

Nicholas Tidemann I think you are going on a tangent here. We are talking about intellectual property and guarding against others profiting from other peoples work. Under any other name this is theft. Of course there shouldn't be a government taking property but government is necessary to guard against others taking YOUR property.

[@flednanders7556]

As a disclaimer, I am but a layman, but my position on this issue is as follows. It is only theft if ideas are property. I think that is incorrect. Nothing is being taken _from_ you. You don't forget your idea once another person adopts it; thoughts are infinitely replicable at no cost. Nothing is being done to you or any possession of yours. Also, any given innovation a person makes is already typically an amalgam of old technologies in some way. It is give and take; abolishing IP is just more honest. I do not think we should be trying to undermine the mimetic nature of human interaction; that is how we learn. I think an IP free landscape encourages more people to participate and makes consistent skill much more important than luck when keeping up with an industry. We could still credit people with coming up with ideas without IP as well if fame and glory is that important. "Profiting off of other peoples work" is what many already do, but when all people are given the right to do it I think we'll be a more equitable society.

[@joeseth05]

I like the way he makes his points, thoroughly

[@hernantz]

Amazing presentation!

[@amirbabfish]

how did you get from patents to FDA at the end? that could be a topic for another day :) and i wouldn't put patent laws and health regulations in the same basket.

[@jaminunit]

A very very good speech, thanks for sharing.

[@Hvalfisk]

@markdeming1989 if you write a book, and someone copies it and puts their own name in place of yours and sells it. Copyright should protect against that. But if someone makes an exact copy of it and gives the copy to his friend. Copyright shouldn't stop this.

[@generalsalami8875]

True. Identity theft is just fraud like any other. You don't need ip.

[@colebehnke7767]

That’s fraud and is already covered without IP laws.

[@mtanousable]

Also, Linux is rather awesome for certain applications and uses. It's just generally an example of software that is a capital good more than a consumer good. There is no consumer good industry in "open-source", as the model doesn't really fit. That said, you don't need patents for consumer software, even with something like Windows. You could realize updates for "official" copies and have contractual usage agreements. It need not have force - piracy is, at its root, a service problem.

[@muskduh]

thanks for the video

[@bushpigification]

My new hero :)

[@skytrooper1980]

I think I agree with Kinsella. I have been thinking about net neutrality a lot lately. It's basically a question of democracy. Basic ideas of the Enlightenment. He is absolutely on the right path in his thinking. Patents have always been nothing more than a means to power, basically a result of greed or monetary ambition. Service, on the other hand, and material, should have value. This is deep philosophical, democratic thinking.

[@billgreenjeans]

If we accepted the “divine right of kings or queens” then logically we would have to ask to King or Queen for permission to use land. Governments have no such claim so asking it for permission is a mute point. Kings and governments granting exclusive use land supports Stephan Kinsella's supposition and human or government land grants are a form of monopoly that flies in the face of true capitalism.

[@jeronimotamayolopera4834]

GREAT.

[@ali3ser]

I like the ideas but can someone explain me if the inventor of a product isnt given a monopoly for a short period of time, how can that company cover their costs of developing the invention? Wouldnt competing companies just copy the invention right as it enters the market and of course since they didnt have any developement costs they could go for a lower price? And eventually hurting the inventor company and discouraging inventing and encouraging copying a product and devaluing it? I'm not trying to prove any statist opinions I sincerely dont understand it. Please tell me if I'm being economically illiterate cause I would love to get llluminated in this topic.

[@alexhopkins2053]

On the basis of buying the product you opt in to a contract that you cannot replicate the product at a different company or disclose information to someone else about the product or you would be arrested and dealt with by a court.

[@hbgl8889]

They would make up for their development expenses by being the first to marked if the product proves to be a success. So as a competitor you would have to know exactly which innovation to copy then you would have to pay the cost of reverse engineering it and building the tooling to manufacture the product.

[@richdobbs6595]

What is the optimal rate of innovation in a society? Pragmatically, in a mixed economy, the benefits arise privately, but the costs end up being socialized. So, given the difficulties that we are facing with societal change I would argue that we should raise the standards with respect to novelty and/or shorten the length of monopoly protection. With Pharma, this should be coupled with lowering delays via regulatory approval. In the current IP environment, developing fully autonomous driving will benefit Google and Tesla and the employers of drivers. But the displaced drivers will still need to eat and live someplace, and many will end up not being productively employed, will end up sucking up public resources. Google and Tesla will pursue this activity even without IP protection. No need to further encourage it.

[@ihateyankees3655]

They'll have a big head start in producing the product. By the time competitors get the tooling set up and start putting out copies of his invention, the original creator will have had plenty of time to cement his hold on the market.

[@imonlyamanandiwilldiesomed4406]

Big companies can produce new products very fucking quickly and have an in-road with the major markets like Amazon and Wal-mart etc.

[@Rahuiel123]

Linux is in no way junk. Linux by itself, is many, many times better than Windows by itself. The only reason that Windows is "better" is because it has more support from 3rd parties, such as game and other software developers. If all of the sudden Linux became a sizable part of the marketshare, giving major companies a reason to make 3rd party software for it, it'd blow Windows out of the water in no time. But Windows keeps a vicious stranglehold on the market with some very unethical tactics.

[@1d10tcannotmakeusername]

Using Linux right now! Ubuntu, but still Linux.

[@VerumAdNauseam]

In order for the government to secure the IP rights of corporate monopolies like Microsoft, it must deprive the rest of us our basic property rights. So, to answer your question, it takes all of our land, labor, and capital to create windows. Linux is only an example of free software struggling to survive in a market dominated by aggressive software monopolies. It's not junk but it's not as good as it could be due to IP monopolism.

[@oddnejmus]

At the same time - much thanks to the web - people learn to see that nothing comes from nothing, that everything is related and created from something else, explicitly or implicitly. Every last grain of everything you create doesn't have to be and can't magically by created out of the blue. This means that the respect for rigid copyright laws are lost and that creative people dare to be playful, inventive and develop their imagination.

[@markdeming1989]

I'm persuaded by this idea but still confused a bit. If I sell a book and someone else copies it, like titles, text and all making an exact duplicate, is this something ip could/ should protect against?

[@generalsalami8875]

You're think of identity theft. Where you're trying to pretend you wrote it just to garner off the success of others. This is fraud. You're lying in the trade. What we're talking about is patents. I can go into detail if you want about why ideas logically don't constitute as property (& why it shouldn't) if you want.

[@SSTTEEAALLTTHH]

If you can do it better, cheaper or faster, what moral ground does anyone have for preventing you to produce a product?

[@truevoice08]

@TimothyBragan property rights are not social constructs since there is nothing to replace it with. The issue is whether you are consistent with it or not. Hans Hoppe has already addressed the arguments of the utilitarians.

[@readrothbard153]

I always pretend to he deaf if I fly next to a talker... works well until i forgot once and asked the woman who i'd spurned to get the attention of the flight attendant.

[@Tobbeh99]

That thing about that people had to burn copies because of copyright made me think "no....". What if someone made an entire car and then it was a pirate copy of someones patent, and that person would have to destroy that car (or not use, or only use it privately). Your literally destroying culture and wealth. I also think that there's a difference of producing something and owning something. Aka someone who creates some intellectual property is the producer of the idea, but if you sell that idea or share it with someone, then you don't own it anymore, or you're not the sole owner. Like someone can produce an apple and sell it or give it away, and thereby not being the owner of it. If I create a song, then I'm the composer of that song. Does that mean I own the song? Yes. Does that mean that anybody else can't own it? No. If I play my song or teach someone my song, then that person could learn it and then own the knowledge about the song, therefore owning it.

[@exnihilonihilfit6316]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotional_reasoning

[@Xasew]

Never seen anyone come up with a good principled argument in favor of IP, but it seems that even the utilitarians are completely lost. Mostly the arguments start with the assumption that IP promotes innovation and that there are no alternatives. And they ignore history as much as they can. Obviously it's easy to argue if your assumptions already have the answer in them...

[@cool70200]

interesting, thx

[@CurtHowland]

@fluff125 "the researcher who spends years of his life" Labor theory of value. "the businessman who busts his ass" Labor theory of value. "new technology is the ONLY thing in the long run which improves standards of living" Yep, I agree, which is why sharing as widely as possible as quickly as possible is such a good idea. Thank you for opposing intellectual monopoly.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Curt: Lack of legal protection inhibits to development of new technology. No one will invest time and money only to have their valuable intellectual assets misappropriated.

[@donaldclifford5763]

@linlinö önilnil Potentially new applications are licensable. Obviously any hypothetical patent for the original concept is long expired.

[@dong.7519]

nicely worded sir. let's do lunch

[@riverotter68]

this guy takes the long way 'round the barn

[@Sivels]

@ourben Why is it "right" to own property? If you hold as your core premise that it's right for you to live your life, to sustain your life etc. etc. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since a man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. Without property rights, you're a slave.

[@099749]

21.37- I think the assumption works under the idea that people will be forced to look else where and think up new ideas, if they want a paternt. Opposed to:- ideas being used by anyone and everyone. Bottomline is if you give an idea to five different people and ask them to do something with it- they will all generate different things with that idea- Hands down the latter is better, I.P- supresses others ability to develop and use ideas, for personal gain soley, when in a free market the

[@GarethFerguson83]

Prime example, Apple vs Samsung

[@GenghisVern]

This is surreal. I'd figure mises institute would be all about Rand's argument for IP. Interesting spin. Also didn't know austrian economics was rooted in allodial, private ownership of natural resources.

[@Gamebox27]

@skytrooper1980 Maybe that's why cloning hasn't started yet. They haven't found a way to regulate it and reward someone with a good design.

[@Sivels]

@ourben so the computer that you're typing on right now is not your possesion? You're not controlling it? Property is just the right to exclude. So saying that property doesn't really make sense, but I guess you meant to say property rights don't exist... Property rights is the justification for the enforcement of property, again, the right to exclude i.e. exclude people from your home.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

I'm not aware of anyone else not being allowed to sell software. I know that Apple and Google both compete with Microsoft by selling OS's and other software products. I also know that others distribute Linux for free. I use Microsoft products to create and sell software. I haven't had them come after me, so hopefully it stays that way. I've never paid them a dime in royalties.

[@BenJamin-rt7ui]

Only factors supplied by human effort can be private property. Ideas exist in Platonic space. Land is supplied by nature or God. Thus , while Land and ideas can be discovered, they are not created or invented by humans. Of course discovery should be rewarded, and their are many mechanisms for this to happen without giving those discoverers the right to exclude others from which they didn't create.

[@GenghisVern]

@Guest655321 i'm not deep into the mises thing, it's just like required reading for LP 101. Not too happy about their views on natural resources/ land but that's a big topic. Too bad, this IP thing would fit nicely... if people want exclusive use maybe they should pay for it.

[@SSTTEEAALLTTHH]

What moral argument? That force is ok on people who simply wish to labout because someone before them had a similar idea?

[@Buffalo122333]

There are actually many arguments about utility here. Would technology progress faster or slower without patents. Would their be more or fewer books, movies, music and games without copyrights. Can we enforce IP laws and remain free. The over riding question is the last. There will be no freedom left if our government is allowed to touch the internet in any way.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

Consider this, in order for you to acquire an apple, you have to walk up to a tree, and pick it. Mother nature built it. So maybe 5 minutes of your time. Perhaps you had to plant seeds and water it, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, a few hours. In order for me to write software, it may take years, and a hell of a lot more skill. Your argument states that your labor is worth about $0.99, and mine is worth $0.00.

[@Sivels]

@ourben agency for who? themselves? and how can you deny that you own your body, that your mind controls your body?

[@generalsalami8875]

Ideas are not made, they're discovered. You can't own an idea in another's head, nor is it practical to. Imagine if the first person to discover oil got granted a monopoly on it. Yes, if the first person to discover an idea gains a monopoly on it, then that does incentivize more discovery...but it monopolizes it lol. So that lowers innovation within the idea. For example; someone creates the phone. They gain a patent on the phone, now there's less innovation within the phone market & higher prices from constrained supply. With those higher prices it hurts people's purchasing power, so that can prevent/negate other innovations as well. Not only because money is temporarily taken out of circulation to go into the financial sector from the monopolist's investments/savings, but because it allocates more real resources to the monopolist that could've been used elsewhere, like innovation. They only have a positive incentive to innovate unorder to make more profit. They don't have any negative incentive to not squander resources & fail. Not all innovation is worth the cost, even if people are willing to pay higher from a constrained supply of knowledge. Also, you have to take into account the arbitrariness of owning ideas. It's not like physical property with clear & defined boundaries. What is a 'phone'? It has a screen on it, so is a computer a phone? No, it's 'smaller', so is a tablet a phone? What does 'smaller' mean? A dial up phone is considered a phone, & it doesn't even have a screen & is definitely not small. Is anything that can 'call' another person a phone? NOBODY KNOWS! And with this arbitrariness it leads to corruption. It leads to huge lawyer battles. It leads to public spending on enforcement & court cases. It wastes valuable court time that could've been spent on actual property rights. For what? Intellectual property isn't property. It's arbitrary government protectionism. If our goal is to encourage innovation, then why not just subsidize it? Seems much more practical & moral, not to mention easily adjustable. We can give those who've built a false sense of wealth in the IP market time to get out. It's simply a much more practical substitute that I'm willing to compromise on.

[@sanniepstein4835]

Ideas are developed out of years of study, experimentation, and thought. No one ignorant of math, or busy with easier pursuits, ever "discovered" any high tech.

[@generalsalami8875]

@sanniepstein4835 One *discovers* the means of assembling that high tech. A recipe/blueprint is a *discovery.* Multiple people can make that same/similar discovery with no affiliation to one another. No two people can claim exclusive ownership over the same thing. That's contradictory. Granting a monopoly over something because you discovered it inhibits others' ability to make innovations within 'your' idea & make new discoveries utilizing 'your' idea. Again, imagine if the first person to create the phone garnered a monopoly over the entire phone market. We would still be using wired brick sized cellphones. Also, it's impossible to clearly define the boundaries of ownership in IP law. In my phone example, does that grant the monopolist ownership over all telecommunication devices? The parameters are arbitrarily set by the state. Lastly, regardless of the distinction between 'discovery' & 'creation' when pertaining to ideas, you've yet to dispute the consequences of this monopoly over ideas, which harbors inherently arbitrary parameters.

[@generalsalami8875]

@@sanniepstein4835 Are you going to provide a rebuttal? I've thoroughly debunked everything you've stated.

[@Sivels]

@ourben "No property infers no property." no I don't get it, please enlighten me, o wise one, on what appears to be nonsense.

[@jeronimotamayolopera4834]

DOWN WITH THE FDA.

[@Frenchyification]

I am still divided on the issue but this video did make me rethink twice about intellectual property. It is true that it is wrong not to allow competition in so many small fields, such as HIV vaccine research, etc. but at the same time, what incentive would scientists have to innovate, invent, and research if they won't be credited for it?

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

What incentive made inventors invent before patent monopoly laws in history?

[@colebehnke7767]

What do you mean won’t be credited? If you created it that’s the truth, and if else someone clams to have made it that is a lie and they are liable to be sued.

[@099749]

11.10- to- 12.20- agree completly, not free market!

[@CurtHowland]

@fluff125 "It is fair" To whom? And why is it right just because the beneficiaries of it say it's "fair"? Is that like "fair tax"? "Fair poverty?" "Fair starvation?"

[@Sivels]

@ourben yeah, right, who needs self-ownership?

[@reapfreak]

I don't get pro IP people. I can understand some kind of social norm that recognizes the first person to achieve something, like the first scientist to publish. The problem is whether or not you use lethal force to protect "ownership" of a nonscarce good.

[@RandoomDude]

It's more lucrative to be pro IP if you have a big business and want your monopoly to be protected, at least short-term, long term it just harms everyone

[@BruellwuerfelTV]

there is a fallacious assumption in your argument: how can you conclude that the more books (i.e. novels) there are, the better? Perhaps the market does not need another book of this kind and thus gives the author this information through the market system.

[@aenkmnp]

@FightinWordsUSA IP is not logically compatible with real P. Two people on an island - one produces a fishing net, the other guy takes it without permission -> it's theft -> force is permitted. Now imagine the other guy copies him and produces a net for himself by homesteading property and mixing it with his own labor. If IP was true the first guy is allowed to use force to stop him. How is that moral? v=jQeaVBIMnoI

[@magister343]

Why should natural resources found deep in the earth be private property? If you read Locke carefully you will find that he only meant his homesteading principle to apply when there was plenty of other natural resources of equal quality available for others, requiring it to be essentially not scarce. He also did not support permanent titles to land, but only allowed claims while in use to protect the products of labor. Geo-Libertarians are the true heirs of Lockean, Classical Liberal tradition.

[@099749]

cont.... best use of the idea with things chaged and added to it, is what generates new things and compertician between these different uses of that idea, hence ip- will always be a negative, interms of market vibrancy, innovation and compertician. Ofcourse the IP people seek to maintain and dominate what they have and own rather than innovating- possibly because often ideas are stolen- and not understood by the thief. Ip also allows for compertician-ideas to be buried, by the lience holder!

[@michaeleldredge4279]

He lost me when he claimed that IP supporters use the fact that Einstein worked at a patent office as a justification for IP. That is almost a textbook case of a strawman argument. And if you want a numerical analysis fine. Take an author. He writes full time and publishes 1book/year. Under the current system he can just write a novel and sell it to a publisher. Without IP he must send half his time earning money. He now publishes .5books/year. The world is worse off by .5books/year.

[@flednanders7556]

And many more books are made based off of his. That's more books right? Also, no IP doesn't mean no reviews. The best permutations of that work will rise to the top and whatever message is being communicated through these books is about as well communicated as it can possibly be, not to mention the fact that it is now free on the internet. That's a lot of good than we must weigh against the dip in monetary incentives argument. It may really cull some of the garbage clogging up the Earth to curb this monetary incentive and allow concrete goals to more equally share the role in motivating innovation.

[@sofia.eris.bauhaus]

are you saying people could nit pay authors if there were no copyright? people are perfectly willing to pay for literature they value. the difference is that in a copyright system, only a fairly small portion of the sales typically goes to the creator and the rest is burned for middlemen, advertinsing and censorship measures. people will learn that if they support creators and innovators, they can make a real impact on what is produced, especially for smaller creators.

[@generalsalami8875]

Ideas are not made, they're discovered. You can't own an idea in another's head, nor is it practical to. Yes, if the first person to discover an idea gains a monopoly on it, then that does incentivize more discovery...but it monopolizes it lol. So that lowers innovation within the idea. For example; someone creates the phone. They gain a patent on the phone, now there's less innovation within the phone market & higher prices from constrained supply. With those higher prices it hurts people's purchasing power, so that can prevent/negate other innovations as well. Not only because money is temporarily taken out of circulation to go into the financial sector from the monopolist's investments/savings, but because it allocates more real resources to the monopolist that could've been used elsewhere, like innovation. They only have a positive incentive (for the most part) to innovate unorder to make more profit. They don't have any negative incentive to not squander resources & fail. Not all innovation is worth the cost, even if people are willing to pay more from a constrained supply of knowledge. The amount of incentive to acquire ip is directly proportional to how long they last. The amount of time, effort, & resources delegated to discovery (to obtain IP protections) is directly dependent on how long the protectionism stays. If IP lasts a shorter period of time, then there's less discovery happening to acquire IP. If IP lasts a longer period of time, then less ideas are discovered during the period of monopolization. There is no compromise on this issue by shortening its lifespan. Buissnesses can make up for the cost of invention like every other cost. Raise prices if necessary, increase productivity, garner investments, borrow, charity. Idk. Use your ideas to aid you in that effort, but you can't monopolize them. Also, you have to take into account the arbitrariness of owning ideas. It's not like physical property with clear & defined boundaries. What is a 'phone'? It has a screen on it, so is a computer a phone? No, it's 'smaller', so is a tablet a phone? What does 'smaller' mean? A dial up phone is considered a phone, & it doesn't have a screen & is definitely not small. NOBODY KNOWS! And with this arbitrariness it leads to corruption. It leads to huge lawyer battles. It leads to public spending on enforcement & court cases. It wastes valuable court time that could've been spent on actual property rights. It allocates real resources & people to professions like IP lawyers (from both public & private spending) that (absent of IP) would've been used elsewhere. For what? Intellectual property isn't property. It's arbitrary government protectionism. If our goal is to encourage innovation, then why not just subsidize it? Seems much more practical & moral, not to mention easily adjustable. We can give those who've built a false sense of wealth in the IP market time to get out. It's simply a much more practical substitute that I'm willing to compromise on.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

Nonsense. A monopoly would be if you weren't allowed to sell an operating system. Using your argument, you should be able to take food from a farmer and sell it even though it was his land, labor, and capital that produced it. It amazes me that you would think that you should be able to take something that cost hundreds of millions to produce and resell it your self to reap the reward.

[@skytrooper1980]

And to patent genes is totally nuts. It's a natural creation, not artificial, and no one man or organization should be able to patent genes. That really really holds progress back, because the next guy might have a better idea for the genes than the so called "owner." It's actually a bit sickening.

[@deeplovegroove]

So someone else can publish my book competitively and disempower me, the source? Another band can play my music, make it popular, and overshadow me, the source? Scumbag companies with slaves in other countries can use ideas carefully cultivated in a free society and empower their barbarity? Though I love Ron Paul and will vote for him, some of this Libertarian stuff is a bit off-base. Noticing how horrid some of their artwork is, it is clear why they wish to be able to copy someone elses!

[@generalsalami8875]

Ideas are not made, they're discovered. You can't own an idea in another's head, nor is it practical to. Imagine if the first person to discover oil got granted a monopoly on all oil. Yes, if the first person to discover an idea gains a monopoly on it, then that does incentivize more discovery...but it monopolizes it lol. So that lowers innovation within the idea. For example; someone creates the phone. They gain a patent on the phone, now there's less innovation within the phone market & higher prices from constrained supply. With those higher prices it hurts people's purchasing power, so that can prevent/negate other innovations as well. Not only because money is temporarily taken out of circulation to go into the financial sector from the monopolist's investments/savings, but because it allocates more real resources to the monopolist that could've been used elsewhere, like innovation. They only have a positive incentive to innovate unorder to make more profit. They don't have any negative incentive to not squander resources & fail. Not all innovation is worth the cost, even if people are willing to pay higher from a constrained supply of knowledge. Also, you have to take into account the arbitrariness of owning ideas. It's not like physical property with clear & defined boundaries. What is a 'phone'? It has a screen on it, so is a computer a phone? No, it's 'smaller', so is a tablet a phone? What does 'smaller' mean? A dial up phone is considered a phone, & it doesn't even have a screen & is definitely not small. Is anything that can 'call' another person a phone? NOBODY KNOWS! And with this arbitrariness it leads to corruption. It leads to huge lawyer battles. It leads to public spending on enforcement & court cases. It wastes valuable court time that could've been spent on actual property rights. For what? Intellectual property isn't property. It's arbitrary government protectionism. If our goal is to encourage innovation, then why not just subsidize it? Seems much more practical & moral, not to mention easily adjustable. We can give those who've built a false sense of wealth in the IP market time to get out. It's simply a much more practical substitute that I'm willing to compromise on.

[@erelpc]

The patent act is very easy to argue against. Whereas with copyright, even though I'm also against this legislative act as well and believe that people would find alternative business models if it didn't exist, I find it difficult to defend my position.

[@CurtHowland]

@fluff125 "Fair to all creative people who wish to be free from parasites that would steal their work for no money, and no effort." Such people have the ultimate monopoly, and always have. They can choose when, where and to whom to release their work. Or not to release it at all. Something cannot be stolen, which is never released. Do you imagine your "parasites that would steal" argument is new? It is, in fact, the only argument other than the labor theory of value that I have ever seen.

[@DAFUNK213]

Same island and those 2 guys are joined by some guy sporting dreadlocks.He opens a bag of herbs rolls it into a cigarette shaped spliff and smokes it...Do the first two people have the right to use force against him and stop his behavior?

[@Tuxie]

THIS is the guy who should be your next president, or at least finance minister.

[@eagleeye1975]

So far, halfway through the entire thing, this guy's entire argument is the genetic fallacy... "don't like it, because of its roots." After watching the rest of it... we also see cherry picking arguments, appeal to ridicule, strawman... this is all utter rubbish.

[@chuska8383]

I had never thought of the patent system from that perspective. Very interesting lecture. Thanks!

[@magister343]

Those who held valid Letters of Marque and Reprisal were called Privateers rather than Pirates, even though the only practical difference is that they could only attack ships of a certain nation. If patent and copyright holders indist on calling those who do not honor their monopolies Pirates, I propose we should call them Privateers. The big failing of this talk is that you never explained what makes property valid.The term Real Estate betrays the fact that land titles were also royal grants.

[@matthewmorter9679]

i finally get it

[@markflierl1624]

If we eliminated all copyrights, how would this work with movies. I could secretly film the first showing of the new star wars movie. I would then run home and make DVD's of it and sell them for 1 dollar? I agree that all our laws are out of control, but sometimes copyrights could be helpful.

[@markflierl1624]

@blizbla That is still a copyright law. Now we are just going around in circles.

[@alexandreoliveira2756]

Well, if you start selling them for 1 dollar, the producer company of the film will be "forced" to sell them for 1 dollar also, in order to compete with you (or not if you're just selling 5 copies within your neighborhood), and if their sales are high enough, they make profits, or then, they would have to find other ways to monetize their works (I don't know like, selling tickets to see the actors performing live show in the studio :P). Well, without copyright a lot of things would certainly be different, but we don't know how different.

[@VerumAdNauseam]

"Microsoft hardly has a monopoly." Can you sell copies of Windows? No. That's a monopoly. "How does Microsoft in any way deprive you of your property rights?" I am unable to sell copies of Windows. "You had nothing to do with Windows..." It doesn't matter. I am legally prohibited from using my own labor and capital to produce something without a license from someone else. That's all it takes to deprive us of our property rights.

[@martintheguitarist]

Not clear why you would have the right to own a business you worked hard for but not a book you spent years on writing. Same holds for any scientific research. Patents should be about justice and not innovation. If someone devoted a lot of time and effort to develop an idea they deserve protection.

[@generalsalami8875]

Ideas are not made, they're discovered. You can't own an idea in another's head, nor is it practical to. Imagine if the first person to discover oil got granted a monopoly on all oil. Yes, if the first person to discover an idea gains a monopoly on it, then that does incentivize more discovery...but it monopolizes it lol. So that lowers innovation within the idea. For example; someone creates the phone. They gain a patent on the phone, now there's less innovation within the phone market & higher prices from constrained supply. With those higher prices it hurts people's purchasing power, so that can prevent/negate other innovations as well. Not only because money is temporarily taken out of circulation to go into the financial sector from the monopolist's investments/savings, but because it allocates more real resources to the monopolist that could've been used elsewhere, like innovation. They mainly have a positive incentive to innovate unorder to make more profit. They don't have a negative incentive to not squander resources & fail. Not all innovation is worth the cost, even if people are willing to pay higher from a constrained supply of knowledge. Not all innovation warrants this protection, & the idea could be used elsewhere for other innovation. Also, you have to take into account the arbitrariness of owning ideas. It's not like physical property with clear & defined boundaries. What is a 'phone'? It has a screen on it, so is a computer a phone? No, it's 'smaller', so is a tablet a phone? What does 'smaller' mean? A dial up phone is considered a phone, & it doesn't even have a screen & is definitely not small. Is anything that can 'call' another person a phone? NOBODY KNOWS! And with this arbitrariness it leads to corruption. It leads to huge lawyer battles. It leads to public spending on enforcement & court cases. It wastes valuable court time that could've been spent on actual property rights. For what? Intellectual property isn't property. It's arbitrary government protectionism. If our goal is to encourage innovation, then why not just subsidize it? Seems much more practical & moral, not to mention easily adjustable. We can give those who've built a false sense of wealth in the IP market time to get out. It's simply a much more practical substitute that I'm willing to compromise on.

[@sanniepstein4835]

​@@generalsalami8875 You're simply wrong. Repeating a false assertion will not make it true.

[@generalsalami8875]

@@sanniepstein4835 not an argument

[@generalsalami8875]

They can & should be permitted to own & sell a book. What we disagree with is prohibiting others from doing the same at a cheaper price/higher quality simply because you wrote its content.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

for linuxblows.cfg every time I try to run something. 'ls'??? that only makes sense in someone's head who's brain is askew. 'etc'...how the fuck are you supposed to know what's in that god damn folder. When writing a method, it has to work FOR EVERY situation...not the hare brained linux contrived spaghetti situations. Have you ever looked at the source? It's a MESS! and it shows on how it operates. Worst of all, there are no two installs of it that are the same.

[@schulwitz]

So this guy believes that if I spend 5 years writing a 1000 page book it is completely fair for others to take credit for my book and sell it to others? . If a movie studio spends $400 million making a movie, it is legitimate for me to screen the movie and sell copies of it to others because the movie studio has no rights to controlling distribution? . These are the most basic arguments for copyright and this guy doesn't even address them, he just sets up strawman arguments.

[@Mutation_D]

Len Schulwitz Maybe movie studios wouldn’t be spending $400 million on movies. Maybe you wouldn’t write 1,000 page books in order to control your own distribution.

[@soulfuzz368]

Greasy Controller Gaming beautiful

[@Guest655321]

@etzel33 Lol, there's really a lot more anti than pro-rand sentiment going around there. Mozart was a Red for a perfect example.

[@pemborsky]

There is no inherent quantifiable unit of value for the amount of time and labor needed to transform resources into goods and I have made no such claim. Arguing against strawmen is intellectually dishonest and will bear no fruit in civil discussion. Labor and the products thereof are only worth what market actors are willing to pay for them, That is subjective theory of value, without which the entire corpus of economic theory would fall (like a strawman).

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

Oh, and contrary to popular belief, there are no two installs of Linux that are the same. I guess to get into the Windows v. Linux, I have a game I programmed in Assembler in 1996, and it still runs on Windows 7!!!! That's be fucking impossible with Linux.

[@1d10tcannotmakeusername]

Software from the 2000s and 90s that only runs on XP and earlier is common in the winblows-verse.

[@christo930]

He did not put forth one single argument against IP. He didn't lay out any kind of theory, all he did was talk about the history.

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

Read his short essay, “Against Intellectual Monopoly”

[@christo930]

@@user-wl2xl5hm7k While tend to oppose intellectual property, it's probably for different reasons. Libertarians are wrong about everything. Even when they are right, they are right for the wrong reasons.

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

@@christo930 See Richard Wolff’s recent video on IP, he’s for IP abolition too. But I think Kinsella has better arguments. I recommend the book “Against Intellectual Monopoly”. It’s an empirically sound case against IP by two economists. It put the final nail in the coffin regarding IP for me.

[@christo930]

@@user-wl2xl5hm7k A book, ironically enough, with IP and being sold on Amazon. (I know that selling books is not a violation of anti-IP, I just think it is humorous) . The insanity around IP reaches the ridiculous. We now have over 50 years from the author's death and I think the mickey mouse act extended that even more. There are books written 100 years ago still having copyright enforced. Mickey Mouse should absolutely not be still covered under IP laws. Of course, I think everyone at Disney should arrested, tried and then shot. But nobody cares what the "dirt people" (that would be us) think. Politicians care about what their owners think. The owners want to reach into our pockets and so that is what the laws gives them.

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

@@christo930 No it’s free online. You can buy it in a nicely published book if you want. But the book is free.

[@skytrooper1980]

This is a fuzzy area of ethics. You're talking about information, which has no physical form. It doesn't even really exist. To possess an idea is morally unethical after the idea leaves the creator's brain and enters humanity. At that point, to say that others can't experiment with the idea is to trample on civil liberties. Period. It inhibits democracy, because people should have the right to freely exchange ideas. It would create competition of course, but is better for the greater good

[@Shrunkenhead61]

To me, patents, and the like, are just fear of competition. He goes much further but as a consumer, I think I would like better products. Like he mentioned, I'm tired of either Apple or Microsoft. There is Linux but Linux proves that IP is bad. The amazing run-a-round Linux has to do to get the tools mac and Microsoft secure is just sad. Microsoft takes from Linux easily. Technology and patents hurt the medical field too and in doing so, health care goes up.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

Sorry to have offended your precious OS.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

---cont--- Config files all over the place. Random permissions. It's a clusterfuck to do shit. nm...sudo...ls...How the fuck is anyone supposed to know what that means??? It's cryptic crap. The package manager has ruined my install several times. I hate the argument "well Windows sucks". Yes it does, at some things. But since there is a profit motive there is a reason to fix the problems, and they do. With open source Linux, no one has any reason to fix everything that's so fucked up.

[@Hudson.Mekeland]

This guy needs to debate George Mason Law professor Adam Mossof or Ayn Rand Institute president Yaron Brook instead of the cherry-picked strawmen he claims are the "best" arguments he's ever heard in defense of IP. Nowhere in this mess of a speech does he address the objective moral argument for property as a value produced by a rational mind.

[@ShrugMeSilly245]

Bad jokes, but good points.

[@1d10tcannotmakeusername]

I thought the jokes were slightly amusing. Especially the one about anarchists drinking herbal tea.

[@VerumAdNauseam]

A monopoly is what you have when I'm not allowed to reproduce and sell what you produce. I'm not coming to your farm and taking your crops, I'm growing my own crops with the seeds I saved from the crops I bought from you. The seeds are rightfully mine and I should be free to do whatever I want with them. What you're arguing is that I owe you royalties from the sales of my crops just because the seeds came from your farm. That's nonsense.

[@donaldclifford5763]

Payment can be in the form of royalties, or outright purchase.

[@schulwitz]

@CurtHowland . Sorry but I didn't follow any of that.

[@marksnow9438]

I really really sympathize with AnCap philosophy, but lately I can't seem to get over the concern that this will all lead to some type of neo-feudalism. I guess my problem is that I can't seem to make a moral decision on the most basic point in all this, the legitimacy of private property and how far its justification would intellectually take me or not take me. When he mentions all minerals should be privately owned, I just honestly feel concern over that. These are questions I ask myself, and cannot answer: Why does one man have a right to tell another man he can't walk upon a part of the earth? If I draw a line in front of me, while wielding a gun, and post a sign saying anyone who crosses that line will be shot, who is the one committing aggression - the 'trespasser', or me the 'property owner'? Communalism is just a disaster, though, and it seems like both sides of the argument are destined to be horrible either way. We can't ethically share what is here on earth (as we've already shown over and over) and we can't morally withhold from others. I just want to be left alone and AnCap (and AnPac) are the closest thing I find to that. But the consumerism, materialism, greed, and 'ambition' that comes with egotistical humans in the marketplace is not something I can support happily, either. Really all I become more convinced of as the years go by, and I read more and more, is that life is completely absurd and there very well might not be any good, or even reasonable, solutions to many of our problems. Sorry if this is just rambling.

[@rickelmonoggin]

+Mark Snow Not at all; you hit upon an important point regarding anarcho-libertarianism; What happens if there is a shortage of land to be homesteaded? What happens to those people who are unable to own any land? Where do they go? These people would be forced to be the slaves of whoevers land they happened to be on at the time or forced into the sea.

[@donald347]

+Richard Hunter "These people would be forced to be the slaves of whoevers land they happened to be on at the time or forced into the sea." how ould they be forced to do anything?

[@rickelmonoggin]

They wouldn't be forced to do anything other than not go on other peoples' land.

[@TN-pj5lk]

wikipedia.org/wiki/geolibertarianism For a more succinct view of property rights in land, where economic rent is not property and instead distrubuted to the community.

[@TN-pj5lk]

Also see "lockean proviso"

[@russjordan6039]

The guy is way off base in so many ways. BTW please go to my website and buy my book. It is actually his book that I copied and put into word. I will send you the file for 1/2 the cost of his collection of his goofy ideas, and by his logic he can do nothing, but you know he would try to stop me with very legal precedents that he is railing against. Patents were put into place to help share knowledge with all the people in a nation. It has worked well for the United States, is there negatives, of course, what does not have a negative. The guy just picks little tidbits to sound good but his logic is extremely flawed. Gosh, I wish I knew the formulae for Coke, alas they did not share that by using a patent to teach others in our country how to make it, I bet this guy would want the government to beat it out of them to allow us to all share in each others ideas to help Capitalism and have a very rosy world. Wait a minute, there is a way to share the knowledge with all in a country....it is called the Patent system. There is a reason the patent system was put in place, folks should understand that before they dive any further into this debate. SPECIAL SALE send me a Nickle and i will send you my book, which the exact copy of his book, act now while supplies last.

[@rickelmonoggin]

Any argument you make against intellectual property rights you could also make against other kinds of property rights. Property rights exist purely because there is a a government to enforce them, otherwise all you have is what you can hold by the barrel of a gun. Intellectual property rights are entirely just: Imagine a song-writer spends ten years learning music and perfecting their craft. They write a great song that is very popular. Without IP rights bootleggers take the recording, and resell copies of it without paying the original writer any royalties. Clearly they have stolen proceeds which would otherwise have gone to the songwriter and without having to make the sacrifice of ten years of hard work. How is that not theft?

[@explosives101]

+Richard Hunter They are communists trying to redefine "theft" and "property": strangerousthoughts.wordpress.com/2010/11/14/the-economic-principles-of-intellectual-property-and-the-fallacies-of-intellectual-communism/

[@JM-co6rf]

+Richard Hunter Do you own your body? Or is that ours?

[@rickelmonoggin]

I do own my body. Not everyone does though: slaves for example.

[@JM-co6rf]

+Richard Hunter You can't own another person. That would be applying 2 contradictory moral rules for the same species. Force, yes. Ownership, no. No more than 4+4=5, just because I wrote it down.

[@rickelmonoggin]

So you deny that such a thing as slavery exists?

[@imonlyamanandiwilldiesomed4406]

Wouldn't this hold-back innovations? Why should I bust my ass inventing something if some company can just swoop in and build it?

[@ludwigvonsowell5347]

I'm Only A Man And I Will Die Some Day just spitballing but maybe pitch it to a company to be sold.

[@soulfuzz368]

I'm Only A Man And I Will Die Some Day build it better

[@denada9482]

What if your invention depended on someone else's idea, his or her "property"? You didn't know but they were "first". Let's say we lived in a society where intellectual rights were sacred. There is this vast database and patent applications were essentially free. The tomb of filings humongous and growing at an exponential pace. Maybe even patent officers wincing at their rulings because they didn't even truly understand the invention until later on.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

"Software, like ideas, is infinitely reproducible" That's a false statement. There is a finite amount of finite state machines.

[@supreme84x]

You obviously do not know what anarchy means.

[@ItsAllAboutGuitar]

No it's not. Linux has destroyed the common sense of anyone who has tried to use it seriously(from the Unix Haters Handbook). It has wasted billions of dollars in millions of hours of people's time. Every Linux expert always says how easy something is, then they take hours to solve something that should take minutes.

[@joh7743]

Wow. I partition my harddrive and install Linux alongside Windows, because they both are better for different purposes, so I switch back and forth depending on my current needs. Im a programmer and Linux comes with C (gcc) out of the box, and programming languages and libraries are so easy to add and set up using in 'apt install', and I feel a lot better running ssh over linux then from Windows. Some of us actually use Linux for actual purposes.

[@wsp67326]

when you take away the incentive for research and development, no one will undertake research and development... perhaps the best thing to do in our country is institute compulsory licensing if the patent owner does not practice the claimed invention in the US (i.e., patent trolls) and thus have set low royalty payments. But, to say that IP is not important to the economy (in the past and certainly in the future) is just wrong. His copyright stance is quite silly, too, IMHO.