Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 02:52:57 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
That's all fine and dandy but notice I said Author, not corporation owner.

As in limit the IP to the actual person that created something in regards to art (patents are a different beast and should be treated differently and apart).

Why isn't IP transferrable? Is it property or not? (It's not.)

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
Imagine you wrote something really good and that becomes popular but there's no IP law. Here comes Disney and takes ALL of your IP to make movies without giving you a red cent and maybe not even mentioning you.

Then, because there's no IP law they print what you already published and sell it, with better art, then they hire some wageslave to write in your style new novels.

Sure, you could take theirs and print it too, but you can't produce new stuff with their levels of production (I mean the art, proofreading, etc.) or create movies, tv shows, etc to compete with them on those markets.

I already addressed this oft-repeated nightmare scenario above, but I'll try again. If you think I'm too dense, here's a career patent attorney answering the same nightmare scenario (less than 5 minutes): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWeUGU6SrYw

So the existing fanbase of the already-popular really good thing are going to run off as soon as Disney copy-pastes some art in and generates an assembly-line generic-brand version? What happened when Marvel took their really good popular comics and turned them into assembly-line garbage designed to be hated by the original audience?

Let's assume the original fanbase stays with the original author (because they would), and Disney builds a big new fanbase that likes the new soulless garbage, and makes lots of money from people who wouldn't have liked the original anyway: So?

Let's even assume the original author loses their whole fanbase to Disney. Again: So? Do they have some kind of right to their audience's preferences?

And you know, if it weren't for IP protectionism helping the Little Guys so much, all those classic Marvel artists and writers would still be at it, making more of the stuff their audience loved, with the characters and settings they enjoyed. Thanks to IP, it's all gone. You get what Marvel says you get!

But I understand your ideal is much more nuanced: we should instead get what Marvel says we get until all the relevant creative people die.

What an improvement! So a creator gets paid to make a new comic, and he loves working on it, and his small audience loves reading it, but the company cancels it and says "No, we're done with that. We need something new." Now we can wait until he dies to get some other schmuck's take on it! (No, Marvel is not going to sell any of their artist/writer creations back to them after they quit.)

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
The net result would be no one would publish shit unless they were being paid for handsomely by some megacorp.

Nope. Lots of artists already publish their work directly into the public domain while making a living at the same time. The software industry has already figured this out. All new software that anyone cares about (usually written and maintained by a single person, for fun) is committed directly into the public domain via the MIT license. Artists will eventually follow suit, regardless of whether IP law catches up with them.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
Don't get me started with medical drugs because it's offtopic and a worst can of worms.

Why is it off-topic? There may be different legal categories of IP, but they all boil down to telling other people they're not allowed to do a thing (or even something similar to a thing) that someone else has already done.

If we're so worried about RPG PDF sellers and their right to benefit from their labor, then why wouldn't medical advancement be even more important to protect, using the same principles? The fact is: "Making something that someone else has already made" isn't a crime.

That's why we have the invented concept of "Intellectual Property"; if IP was really property, it would just be called "property", and stealing it would just be a regular existing crime called "theft". Not even the government considers the spread of information to be "theft". They call it "[commie BS] infringement".

Quote from: Pat on October 06, 2021, 01:39:02 PM
No. If you released it, it becomes part of the commons.

If you're not an IP abolitionist now, you will be in six months. Check out the Stephan Kinsella talk I linked in my earlier post.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
So the heirs have sometime to profit from it in the case of an untimely death of the author.

Where does this right to profit from things come from?

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
Patents are a special case, I think it should be tied to the ammount invested in the development: Meaning you have enough time to cover said costs and make I dunno twice that ammount in profits?

Patents are a joke. Did you know entertaining a cat with a laser is patented?

There is one legitimate reason to seek out a patent: to prevent a patent troll from doing it for you and criminalizing the business you started. Seeking to enforce the patent, though, just makes you a commie.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
My thing is that if I publish a game and it turns out to be a hit I want protections so no megacorp can just take it from me. Same thing with novels etc.

I used to think this way, but then I got over it. Whenever I publish a book, it'll be freely available digitally, right down to the source files and publishing toolchain, which will be hosted on GitHub, with instructions on how to produce the for-print PDF. I have no fears of losing any money to megacorps or Mega folders.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
I find it ridiculous that the estate of a long dead author still has the trademark of part of the creation and can use it to bully you to give them money or risk a lawsuit.

I also find it ridiculous that WotC holds the trademark over stuff they didn't create so many years after it's creation. I might agree if it was the still living Author.

You're on the right track; eventually you will find it ridiculous that a living author can legally bully you into giving them money or risking a lawsuit.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
If ppl can't benefit from their intellectual labor then why on God's green earth would they ever publish anything?

Who has said they can't? The only people telling anyone they can't benefit from things are IP protectionists.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
If you are my neighbor and decide to observe me and copy my house, brick by brick, with YOUR OWN BRICKS, I do not have a natural right to your property because you benefited from my architectural skills.

Exactly.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
EDIT: MORAL rights are of course natural; no matter if Shakespeare has been dead for centuries, I still cannot claim I am the author of his works because this is fraud.

It's more of an infringement on your own reputation than anything else. This is what Amazon reviews are for, not courts.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
Whether the descendentes of Shakespeare (or HPL or REH) have monopoly rights over their works is purely a legal construct, which is why we are discussing if it should last 10, 20,or 120 years. BTW, my answer would be ZERO, and I publish stuff (and would continue publishing) regardless.

Based.

Why is it different producing bricks than producing a creative work? Time, materials and efort go into both, and the creative work gets something the bricks don't, meaning ANYONE can learn to make bricks, not so to writting the next Harry Potter.

Why can't I go and without paying for your work take your bricks?

Quote from: jhkim on October 06, 2021, 02:57:40 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 02:41:48 PM
And idea would be lets write a novel about X, that's the idea, the novel is made of words and sentences structured by the author to convey his idea, it took him materials, time and effort to write it.

Why is that different from making bricks?

After all the idea of a brick is millenia old, therefore shouldn't the materials and work that go into producing the actual brick be equally up for grabs?

In practice, I support more limited copyright and patent similar to what you're saying, GeekyBugle.

However, I disagree that it is an inherent or natural right. If intellectual property is a natural right, why should it ever expire? If I build my house, I pass it on to my children, and they can pass it on to their children. It is a thing.

I consider Intellectual Property as a special social reward for certain creators, but not a natural right. Just because someone puts time and effort into coming up with something, that doesn't mean they necessarily control it. Sometimes, people can put time and effort into stuff and it isn't rewarded. Society can't guarantee that all time and effort is fairly rewarded - it can just make it possible. So if I spend time cleaning up my local public park or fixing up my rental unit, I won't necessarily be rewarded. People can be Good Samaritans and do work with no legal reward.

So lets say it's not a right, does that mean all IP/Trademark should be abolished?

Of course no one ows you shit for writting a novel, but also why should anyone be able to just grab it, print it and sell it without giving you any money?

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 02:57:48 PM

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 02:52:57 PM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
If you are my neighbor and decide to observe me and copy my house, brick by brick, with YOUR OWN BRICKS, I do not have a natural right to your property because you benefited from my architectural skills.

Why is it different producing bricks than producing a creative work? Time, materials and efort go into both, and the creative work gets something the bricks don't, meaning ANYONE can learn to make bricks, not so to writting the next Harry Potter.

Why can't I go and without paying for your work take your bricks?

I think you've misread Eric's example. It's not the bricks that are being copied; it's the pattern that the bricks are laid in to produce the desired house (the one the neighbor designed using his own time, money, and expertise). This is exactly analogous to copying a book, which is merely an ordered sequence of symbols. And if you think that's downplaying books, we can also say that any particular house, no matter how magnificent, is merely a particular arrangement of building materials.

The difference in copying a house from copying a book is just the ease and low cost with which it can be done.

Quote from: estar on October 06, 2021, 02:53:46 PM
The problem is that intellectual doesn't embody physical products like a house. If I hear you sing a song and then sing it myself. I haven't taken anything from you that is the equivalent of adverse possession of house. You still know the song, and you can still sing it.

The natural state of ideas is to spread, be used, and adapted. However many ideas whether it is a patent, copyright, or trademark require at a minimum an investment of time to realizes especially as cultures and societies grew more sophiscated and diverse. So it is a good policy to give a creator exclusive rights to their creations.

However nothing in human society exists in a vacuum. Except for a handful every ideas rests on the shoulder of those who came before. So any type of intellectual exclusivity should be limited in time. Patents confer the broadest type of monopoly so they are only limited to 20 years. Copyright only cover an expression of an idea so their duration is long as the base idea often can be expressed in different and novel was. Trademark are effectively indefinite but their use is to uniquely identify a product or a group of products. So they have to be in current use and the right enforced or the monopoly they confers ceases to exist.

Earlier it was asked how can writer do what musicians can do with performance. The answer is patronage. People pay a specific authors periodic fees to continue to write. With the rise of the internet and digital technology many prize authenticity and are willing to pay for it for something they like. With the efficiency of the internet and digital technology it is possible to make a go of this with only a couple of hundred patron contributing a small amount each month. And you don't even need that many to make it worthwhile if it is supplemental income done in the time one has for a hobby.

As for the future, the chances of Disney or any other multi-national influencing copyright is low. People are far more aware of the issue and far more passionate about it than they were when the last major revision occurred in the 90s. More importantly people are taking matters in their own hands by creating various types of shared or open creative content. There been nothing so far that has been as popular as Star Wars or Marvel, but give it time. Eventually an author or authors will come along that committed to open content and make something that is wildly popular.

Already there are cracks in the system where digital technology allow individual creators to challenge the status quo. Taylor Swift doesn't have the rights to much of her original recording but does have the right to the songs themselves. So she is in the midst of re-recording all her old albums to regain control of her creative catalog. As technology advances the ability to do this will continue to filter downwards if hasn't already.

Finally the legal system isn't totally stacked against those with money. In a fit of sanity Congress inserted a provision that allows authors to take back all the rights during a window of time opening 35 years laters. Steve Jackson recently used this to regain control over the stuff he did for the Fantasy Trip.

So I should be able to take your song, record it and not give you a dime? We're not talking about any random down the street singing it while he goes home, were talking of profiting from your creativity without your consent and without giving you money.

Should forgeries of famous paintings also become not a crime? What's the difference? Lets say I'm Han van Meegeren and I decide to forge Johannes Vermeer paintings and sell them at 100 dollars each. Should this be allowed too? During the life of Johannes Vermeer?

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 03:05:52 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 02:57:48 PM

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 02:52:57 PM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
If you are my neighbor and decide to observe me and copy my house, brick by brick, with YOUR OWN BRICKS, I do not have a natural right to your property because you benefited from my architectural skills.

Why is it different producing bricks than producing a creative work? Time, materials and efort go into both, and the creative work gets something the bricks don't, meaning ANYONE can learn to make bricks, not so to writting the next Harry Potter.

Why can't I go and without paying for your work take your bricks?

I think you've misread Eric's example. It's not the bricks that are being copied; it's the pattern that the bricks are laid in to produce the desired house (the one the neighbor designed using his own time, money, and expertise). This is exactly analogous to copying a book, which is merely an ordered sequence of symbols. And if you think that's downplaying books, we can also say that any particular house, no matter how magnificent, is merely a particular arrangement of building materials.

The difference in copying a house from copying a book is just the ease and low cost with which it can be done.

Nope, I'm making the correct analogy while he's not:

In both cases it takes materials, effort and time to produce the bricks or the novels, why one should be illegal for me to just go and grab while the other not?

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 03:08:14 PM

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 03:05:52 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 02:57:48 PM

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 02:52:57 PM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
If you are my neighbor and decide to observe me and copy my house, brick by brick, with YOUR OWN BRICKS, I do not have a natural right to your property because you benefited from my architectural skills.

Why is it different producing bricks than producing a creative work? Time, materials and efort go into both, and the creative work gets something the bricks don't, meaning ANYONE can learn to make bricks, not so to writting the next Harry Potter.

Why can't I go and without paying for your work take your bricks?

I think you've misread Eric's example. It's not the bricks that are being copied; it's the pattern that the bricks are laid in to produce the desired house (the one the neighbor designed using his own time, money, and expertise). This is exactly analogous to copying a book, which is merely an ordered sequence of symbols. And if you think that's downplaying books, we can also say that any particular house, no matter how magnificent, is merely a particular arrangement of building materials.

The difference in copying a house from copying a book is just the ease and low cost with which it can be done.

Nope, I'm making the correct analogy while he's not:

In both cases it takes materials, effort and time to produce the bricks or the novels, why one should be illegal for me to just go and grab while the other not?

You can't grab anyone's copy of their book. That is stealing, not copying.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 03:08:14 PM
In both cases it takes materials, effort and time to produce the bricks or the novels, why one should be illegal for me to just go and grab while the other not?

Also, what do you mean "one should be illegal ... and the other not"? The point of the house example was that copying a book should be legal, just like copying a house as described would obviously be legal.

I think you have misread someone. You're the one who's been arguing that IP is property, but should also be handled differently from property.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 03:06:54 PM
Should forgeries of famous paintings also become not a crime? What's the difference? Lets say I'm Han van Meegeren and I decide to forge Johannes Vermeer paintings and sell them at 100 dollars each. Should this be allowed too? During the life of Johannes Vermeer?

By "forgery" do you mean making a copy and lying to the customer that it's the original painting? That would be fraud, which is already a crime.

A copy, whether photographic or made from scratch, sold honestly, with no deception involved, is not fraud. Nobody is harmed.

And if the original artist finds out you're selling copies of his paintings for $100, just think of what he could charge for his own copies, let alone the originals. He should be thanking you for the entrepreneurial research.

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 02:52:57 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
That's all fine and dandy but notice I said Author, not corporation owner.

As in limit the IP to the actual person that created something in regards to art (patents are a different beast and should be treated differently and apart).

Why isn't IP transferrable? Is it property or not? (It's not.)

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
Imagine you wrote something really good and that becomes popular but there's no IP law. Here comes Disney and takes ALL of your IP to make movies without giving you a red cent and maybe not even mentioning you.

Then, because there's no IP law they print what you already published and sell it, with better art, then they hire some wageslave to write in your style new novels.

Sure, you could take theirs and print it too, but you can't produce new stuff with their levels of production (I mean the art, proofreading, etc.) or create movies, tv shows, etc to compete with them on those markets.

I already addressed this oft-repeated nightmare scenario above, but I'll try again. If you think I'm too dense, here's a career patent attorney answering the same nightmare scenario (less than 5 minutes): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWeUGU6SrYw

So the existing fanbase of the already-popular really good thing are going to run off as soon as Disney copy-pastes some art in and generates an assembly-line generic-brand version? What happened when Marvel took their really good popular comics and turned them into assembly-line garbage designed to be hated by the original audience?

Let's assume the original fanbase stays with the original author (because they would), and Disney builds a big new fanbase that likes the new soulless garbage, and makes lots of money from people who wouldn't have liked the original anyway: So?

Let's even assume the original author loses their whole fanbase to Disney. Again: So? Do they have some kind of right to their audience's preferences?

And you know, if it weren't for IP protectionism helping the Little Guys so much, all those classic Marvel artists and writers would still be at it, making more of the stuff their audience loved, with the characters and settings they enjoyed. Thanks to IP, it's all gone. You get what Marvel says you get!

But I understand your ideal is much more nuanced: we should instead get what Marvel says we get until all the relevant creative people die.

What an improvement! So a creator gets paid to make a new comic, and he loves working on it, and his small audience loves reading it, but the company cancels it and says "No, we're done with that. We need something new." Now we can wait until he dies to get some other schmuck's take on it! (No, Marvel is not going to sell any of their artist/writer creations back to them after they quit.)

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
The net result would be no one would publish shit unless they were being paid for handsomely by some megacorp.

Nope. Lots of artists already publish their work directly into the public domain while making a living at the same time. The software industry has already figured this out. All new software that anyone cares about (usually written and maintained by a single person, for fun) is committed directly into the public domain via the MIT license. Artists will eventually follow suit, regardless of whether IP law catches up with them.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 10:58:59 AM
Don't get me started with medical drugs because it's offtopic and a worst can of worms.

Why is it off-topic? There may be different legal categories of IP, but they all boil down to telling other people they're not allowed to do a thing (or even something similar to a thing) that someone else has already done.

If we're so worried about RPG PDF sellers and their right to benefit from their labor, then why wouldn't medical advancement be even more important to protect, using the same principles? The fact is: "Making something that someone else has already made" isn't a crime.

That's why we have the invented concept of "Intellectual Property"; if IP was really property, it would just be called "property", and stealing it would just be a regular existing crime called "theft". Not even the government considers the spread of information to be "theft". They call it "[commie BS] infringement".

Quote from: Pat on October 06, 2021, 01:39:02 PM
No. If you released it, it becomes part of the commons.

If you're not an IP abolitionist now, you will be in six months. Check out the Stephan Kinsella talk I linked in my earlier post.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
So the heirs have sometime to profit from it in the case of an untimely death of the author.

Where does this right to profit from things come from?

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
Patents are a special case, I think it should be tied to the ammount invested in the development: Meaning you have enough time to cover said costs and make I dunno twice that ammount in profits?

Patents are a joke. Did you know entertaining a cat with a laser is patented?

There is one legitimate reason to seek out a patent: to prevent a patent troll from doing it for you and criminalizing the business you started. Seeking to enforce the patent, though, just makes you a commie.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
My thing is that if I publish a game and it turns out to be a hit I want protections so no megacorp can just take it from me. Same thing with novels etc.

I used to think this way, but then I got over it. Whenever I publish a book, it'll be freely available digitally, right down to the source files and publishing toolchain, which will be hosted on GitHub, with instructions on how to produce the for-print PDF. I have no fears of losing any money to megacorps or Mega folders.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
I find it ridiculous that the estate of a long dead author still has the trademark of part of the creation and can use it to bully you to give them money or risk a lawsuit.

I also find it ridiculous that WotC holds the trademark over stuff they didn't create so many years after it's creation. I might agree if it was the still living Author.

You're on the right track; eventually you will find it ridiculous that a living author can legally bully you into giving them money or risking a lawsuit.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 01:52:59 PM
If ppl can't benefit from their intellectual labor then why on God's green earth would they ever publish anything?

Who has said they can't? The only people telling anyone they can't benefit from things are IP protectionists.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
If you are my neighbor and decide to observe me and copy my house, brick by brick, with YOUR OWN BRICKS, I do not have a natural right to your property because you benefited from my architectural skills.

Exactly.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
EDIT: MORAL rights are of course natural; no matter if Shakespeare has been dead for centuries, I still cannot claim I am the author of his works because this is fraud.

It's more of an infringement on your own reputation than anything else. This is what Amazon reviews are for, not courts.

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
Whether the descendentes of Shakespeare (or HPL or REH) have monopoly rights over their works is purely a legal construct, which is why we are discussing if it should last 10, 20,or 120 years. BTW, my answer would be ZERO, and I publish stuff (and would continue publishing) regardless.

Based.

Okay, my question here is what if, in this example dosney, takes your thing, word for word, and publishes it at a price you can't compete with, like if i wrote a book and needed to sell for 20$ and disney  makes a word for word copy can afford to sell it for 5$.

Quote from: Slambo on October 06, 2021, 03:32:59 PM
Okay, my question here is what if, in this example dosney, takes your thing, word for word, and publishes it at a price you can't compete with, like if i wrote a book and needed to sell for 20$ and disney  makes a word for word copy can afford to sell it for 5$.

Aside from calling out Disney, you could just tell your fans that if they want to support you and see any future work from you, they'll need to buy your version, even though it's more expensive. You might also want to figure out a way to print cheaper copies.

You already see this kind of thing with POD creators; I've heard, lots of times, things like "Hey, if you're going to buy my new book, I'd really appreciate if you get the Kindle version instead of the print version, because that gives me a much bigger cut."

If you don't have those fans, though, you probably shouldn't be needing to sell any copies of your creative works. That's just called making poor life decisions. Like IP-abolitionist patent attorney Stephan Kinsella says, "Your failed business model isn't my problem."

EDIT:

Copies are infinite; instead of selling copies, provide the creative work for free, and sell related services that can't be copied, like livestream chats, writing advice sessions, or putting a supporter's name in the sequel, etc.

You could even use the first work, freely or cheaply available, to advertise a crowdfund for your next work (which can also be free, and used the same way). This is basically what David Revoy's model is for Pepper & Carrot.

Quote from: GriswaldTerrastone on October 05, 2021, 04:51:42 PM
Yes, the parasitic middlemen: the printers, the truckers, the paper mills, the people who manufacture the equipment needed, the...don't you all just love the compassion and consideration these people have for other people?

Maybe I'm getting too old, but is this for real? Are these people really like that?

I can tell you flat out that there are designers that think this.
No. Really.

But yes, alot of gamers and alot of designers are totally clueless to the publishing process and the costs.
This is also why some kickstarters fail. Because a designer went in unprepared and then found out after the fact just what it costs and takes to be a publisher.

There will always be clueless folk like this. And a few entitled idiots for good measure.

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 03:49:21 PM

Quote from: Slambo on October 06, 2021, 03:32:59 PM
Okay, my question here is what if, in this example dosney, takes your thing, word for word, and publishes it at a price you can't compete with, like if i wrote a book and needed to sell for 20$ and disney  makes a word for word copy can afford to sell it for 5$.

Aside from calling out Disney, you could just tell your fans that if they want to support you and see any future work from you, they'll need to buy your version, even though it's more expensive. You might also want to figure out a way to print cheaper copies.

You already see this kind of thing with POD creators; I've heard, lots of times, things like "Hey, if you're going to buy my new book, I'd really appreciate if you get the Kindle version instead of the print version, because that gives me a much bigger cut."

If you don't have those fans, though, you probably shouldn't be needing to sell any of your creative works. That's just called making poor life decisions. Like IP-abolitionist patent attorney Stephan Kinsella says, "Your failed business model isn't my problem."

And since money talks you'd end without sells because the vast majority would go buy the $5.00 version over the $20.00 one.

To borrow the line from Bioshock, is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?

Whether it's physical goods, or The Great American Novel?

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 03:10:48 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 03:08:14 PM

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 03:05:52 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 06, 2021, 02:57:48 PM

Quote from: Oddend on October 06, 2021, 02:52:57 PM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on October 06, 2021, 02:19:38 PM
If you are my neighbor and decide to observe me and copy my house, brick by brick, with YOUR OWN BRICKS, I do not have a natural right to your property because you benefited from my architectural skills.

Why is it different producing bricks than producing a creative work? Time, materials and efort go into both, and the creative work gets something the bricks don't, meaning ANYONE can learn to make bricks, not so to writting the next Harry Potter.

Why can't I go and without paying for your work take your bricks?

I think you've misread Eric's example. It's not the bricks that are being copied; it's the pattern that the bricks are laid in to produce the desired house (the one the neighbor designed using his own time, money, and expertise). This is exactly analogous to copying a book, which is merely an ordered sequence of symbols. And if you think that's downplaying books, we can also say that any particular house, no matter how magnificent, is merely a particular arrangement of building materials.

The difference in copying a house from copying a book is just the ease and low cost with which it can be done.

Nope, I'm making the correct analogy while he's not:

In both cases it takes materials, effort and time to produce the bricks or the novels, why one should be illegal for me to just go and grab while the other not?

You can't grab anyone's copy of their book. That is stealing, not copying.

But you can grab what cost me money, time and effort and go sell it without giving me money. Because that's not stealing because words and sentences...

Quote from: Ghostmaker on October 06, 2021, 03:55:05 PM
To borrow the line from Bioshock, is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?

Whether it's physical goods, or The Great American Novel?

Though I think that line's specifically about taxes and regulations, Ayn Rand, the basis for Andrew Ryan, was terrible on IP. She and her supporters practically worship "the Intellect".