People around here might not like it because in large our industry (SW) is based on IP but intellectual property is a huge artificial monopoly created under som

People around here might not like it because in large our industry (SW) is based on IP but intellectual property is a huge artificial monopoly created under some economic rationalizations - but the reality is it's getting reduced to rent seeking and concentration of power/wealth. I'm not sure abolishing the concept of IP (patents, copyright, etc.) is the right way to go about it - but I'm 100% certain that there are hideous abuses of the current IP laws and they need to be rewritten with a much more liberal and modern foundation. Having software patents is questionable, having software patents last 20 years is straight out retarded - even if you could argue that some edge case software R&D would not get funded without patents (which is hard to believe because most of the time when something is patented people come up with alternatives and give them away for free simply to avoid patent issues - and that's arguably even more work because the solution space is smaller). A far more realistic software patent would be between 5 and 10 years. Likewise for copyright - copyright claims should expire waaay before the 95 years.