Comments (16)

• Bob Kaercher

  "Signed, Minister of Sensible Ideas"

  Published: January 23, 2009 2:01 PM

• Ohhh Henry

  "This intellectual property law is dead!"

  "No, no it's not dead, it's resting! Remarkable law the Copyright Law, isn't it, eh? Beautiful precedents!"

  "The precedents don't enter into it. It's stone dead."

  "No, no, no, no, no! It's resting!"

  etc.

  Published: January 23, 2009 2:17 PM

• Bruce Koerber

  The head honcho of the Ministry of Silly Talks is Paul Krugman!

  Published: January 23, 2009 4:04 PM

• Henry Miller

  I'd be willing to compromise on a copyright to allow for a 25 year copyright. This is plenty of time to accomplish the goals of those who favor copyright: allow creators to get paid for their efforts. By this standard most (all?) Monty Python is out of copyright.

  Published: January 23, 2009 4:58 PM

• Chad Rushing

  TRANSLATION:

  "The majority of people in modern society no longer have any respect for the inherent, extralegal property rights of creators and the Rule of Law if those things stand in the way of their pursuit of personal gratification in the form of endless entertainment; therefore, people are going to take and use our entertainment offerings without appropriate monetary compensation regardless of what we try to do to stop them, experiencing no guilt or hesitation in the process. One could say that our society, especially its younger generations, is now characterized by unapologetic thievery supposedly justified by an unwarranted sense of entitlement towards the fruit of others' labors.

  "That being the case, we in the entertainment industry have decided to capitulate and give away our offerings for free rather than continue to pursue costly legal actions that rarely result in successful prosecutions, recouped losses, or future deterrence. In that sense, we are now forced to operate as nonprofit enterprises dependent on grateful donors rather than as traditional businesses which are justly entitled to proportional compensation from their customers for their offerings.

  "Hopefully, those forcing us to change our business models in this fashion are not killing in their short-sightedness the very 'geese' that laid the 'golden eggs' they have enjoyed so much over the years or discouraging future 'geese' from offering their 'golden eggs' to the public. Only time will tell."

  Published: January 23, 2009 5:10 PM

• Abhilash Nambiar

  Chad Rushing, I do not think intellectual property is property because it is not a scarce, finite or exclusive resource. The fact that I can watch a movie does not prevent you from watching the same movie. The fact that I can sing does not prevent you from singing the same song. So what is not property cannot be stolen.

  I do agree though that the person who conceived the original concept does have an intimate relationship with his brain child that others may not appreciate. Yet intimacy cannot change what is not property to begin with into property. So theft cannot be said to occur.

  Nevertheless one may conclude that the intimacy between a person and his idea must be respected. But that is a subjective value, which means a market mechanism can accommodate this if indeed making this accommodation aids in wealth generation (and I think it will) and if such accommodation does not aggress on anyone's private property (which I think is possible).

  So an idea cannot be stolen. What is possible is to take false credit for someone else's idea. But that is not stealing unless this results in fraudulent transfer of private property. The market will definitely develop mechanisms to prevent that from happening and one of the ways to achieve that is by developing systems that will enable people to get due credit as well as monetary rewards for coming up with good ideas. If that service is highly sought after there will be more firms providing it, bringing the price down and making it highly affordable. So there.

  Published: January 23, 2009 6:54 PM

• newson

  ...tinges of bitterness, as though all those who view monty python skits on youtube would have actually paid good money for some very old, schoolboy comedy. the gnashing of teeth at the loss of those chimerical opportunity profits (silas: here's the calculation problem).

  if anything, they've probably got those "free-riders" to thank if they're still relatively well-known these days and not on "where are they now?".

  they've managed to capitalize on their python fame in other ways; michael palin is the star in his own adventure travel show.

  this conversion strikes me as similar to metallica vs. napster. first they get snakey, then when that doesn't work, they get pragmatic. that's the real joke.

  Published: January 23, 2009 6:59 PM

• scineram

  "The majority of people in modern society no longer have any respect for the inherent, extralegal property rights of creators and the Rule of Law if those things stand in the way of their pursuit of personal gratification in the form of endless entertainment; therefore, people are going to take and use our entertainment offerings without appropriate monetary compensation regardless of what we try to do to stop them, experiencing no guilt or hesitation in the process. One could say that our society, especially its younger generations, is now characterized by unapologetic thievery supposedly justified by an unwarranted sense of entitlement towards the fruit of others' labors."

  Indeed.

  Published: January 23, 2009 11:01 PM

• newson

  "The majority of people in modern society no longer have any respect for the inherent, extralegal property rights of creators..."

  perhaps because statements like this aren't comprehensible.

  while you're at it, what is "appropriate monetary compensation"?

  Published: January 24, 2009 12:39 AM

• anon

  "The majority of people in modern society no longer have any respect for the inherent, extralegal property rights of creators and the Rule of Law if those things stand in the way of their pursuit of personal gratification in the form of endless entertainment; therefore, people are going to take and use our entertainment offerings without appropriate monetary compensation regardless of what we try to do to stop them, experiencing no guilt or hesitation in the process. One could say that our society, especially its younger generations, is now characterized by unapologetic thievery supposedly justified by an unwarranted sense of entitlement towards the fruit of others' labors.

  "That being the case, we in the entertainment industry have decided to capitulate and give away our offerings for free rather than continue to pursue costly legal actions that rarely result in successful prosecutions, recouped losses, or future deterrence. In that sense, we are now forced to operate as nonprofit enterprises dependent on grateful donors rather than as traditional businesses which are justly entitled to proportional compensation from their customers for their offerings.

  "Hopefully, those forcing us to change our business models in this fashion are not killing in their short-sightedness the very 'geese' that laid the 'golden eggs' they have enjoyed so much over the years or discouraging future 'geese' from offering their 'golden eggs' to the public. Only time will tell."

  
  Couldn't put it better.

  Published: January 24, 2009 2:34 AM

• Marc Sheffner

  I don't get it. While I'm glad to be able to indulge my nostalgia watching old Monty Python shows, how does this encourage creativity and entrepreneurship? Chad Rushing's "translation" seems to me correct.

  Published: January 24, 2009 3:36 AM

• ktibuk

  Yes,

  And also many people that get mugged at gun point make "smart choices" and give up their money instead if fighting back. It is smart on their part.

  The muggers and their apologists are a different matter though.

  Published: January 24, 2009 3:46 AM

• ktibuk

  Sorry for multiple posts, But there are so many IP posts these days I dont want this to go to obscurity.

  Straw man argument is exactly what IP socialists are doing.

  Notice all the posts from Kinsella and Tucker. Also notice the examples given in the book they are promoting.

  They are basicly against patent laws, which have problems beyond IP being a property or not.

  They build a straw man equating patents with IP, and thus try to abolish private property.

  They have no intellectual courage so they can not bring up pirates copying full movies and songs as examples but only examples that doesn't really create any problems, like 'humming a tune while walking" or "forgetting a book on the beach". But when libertarians bring this copying thing, they change the argument to the scarcity issue.

  Which is a non issue anyways because the act of copying without the consent of the owner is aggression. And aggression is an ethics issue, unlike scarcity which is an economics issue.

  Just like fraud, or theft without confronting the owner.

  You have to ask the question, in which circumstances would the owner let someone copy his work, unless he gives out it freely? The answer is clear. By the threat of aggression. So we may conclude that, copying something without the actual consent of the owner is aggression. Just like fraud is actually aggression, although no real threat is used.

  Also IP socialist keep claiming that the owners of IP are actually trying to coerce the copyer. Which is both absurd and unbelievable. Of course they keep bringing up patents which are actually guilty of this to confuse.

  There are two person. A wrote a novel, B copied it. Would there have been a book or am act copying if A hadnt wrote the book? No. So the situation must follow the following steps as far as logic goes.

  A writes the book, B aggress against A by copying the book, without A's consent. B initiated the aggression there fore any force A may use after the fact is in fact ethical.

  IP socialists always confuse property with protection of property, and they also confuse property with value. Logically protection issue must come after the homesteading. Protection issue can not precede homesteading. To claim this is logically absurd. Property is having the right to do whatever one wants with something. Robinson Crusoe owns the fish he catches, he can do whatever he wants with it. He doesn't have to wait for Friday to come to the island, to make the fish his property. If he did he would die.

  Also somethings economic value, has nothing to do with property rights. Something maybe so abundant that it may in fact be free. But "free" is about value and valuations. It is not an ethical concept thus it is not directly related to the property issue.

  Some IP may leak. It is hard to control IP. It may become a free good. But even this doesn't change the fact that the IP is the producers. This may not mean anything as far as exchange economy, but it means a lot ethically.

  Even the IP socialist subconsciously knows this. They may advocate mooching of the creator by being a parasite, but when it comes to giving due to the creator they seem to not be able to go that far and deny the creators part in all of this.

  Yes, Rawling created Harry Potter. You may mooch of her but at least give her her due, right? Promise it wont cost you nothing. And when you are used to taking something for nothing, giving something that doesn't cost anything couldn't hurt, right?

  There are so many fallacies in IP socialists claims that it is hard to expose all of them on comments sections on this blog.

  But if you follow this blog enough you can see the IP socialists blogging here are actually the worst enemies of their positions.

  Since they don't have a comprehensive, contradiction-free theory, the more they post the more they expose themselves. They even use all the classical socialists arguments. They analyze IP as it relates to economics but they don't dare bring up or respond to calculation arguments. Just repeating a bunch of memorized lines.

  So keep at it boys. You may be bloating the blog with this IP thing and cause people to spend their scarce time on these instead of on stuff about the worst financial crises the world has ever seen, but IP is an important issue to.

  Published: January 24, 2009 12:12 PM

• College Parasite

  I'm still making up my mind on this issue, but labeling people who take an anti-IP position "socialists" is a terrible, terrible way to make a point, especially when *your* point of view is the one that logically requires a state apparatus to enforce.

  Published: January 24, 2009 1:39 PM

• Ireland

  Gentelmen, let me thank the pro-IP club for the usual refreshing comments.

  Now that we're through the compulsory figures, some may find it interesting to get the facts, as in finding the confirmation and/or refutal of their theories by observing what the real world has to say about it:
  
  "After Monty Python Goes YouTube, Big Jump In DVD Sales"
  The linked article claims that the sales increase in the Python DVDs is 23,000 percent ...

  Published: January 25, 2009 2:29 AM

• Ireland

  College Parasite, the labeling of anti-IP position as "socialist" is a very poor argument indeed. Unless pro-IP comes with something better, it basically means they lost.

  Published: January 25, 2009 2:40 AM