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That's a lot of shoulds. I hear government spending on research as part of the defense department is super effective.

alasdair_ 10y ago
The irony of someone being sarcastic about DoD research while communicating on a medium that was a direct result of DoD research is pretty funny :)
- whorleater 10y ago
  The internet being a result of DoD research doesn't make them impervious to criticism.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
sctb 10y ago
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12189499 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12189499 and marked it non sequitur.
- forrestthewoods 10y ago
  What? That's absurd. It's not a non-sequitur. It's a statement that massive government research projects are exceptionally overpriced and inefficient. Maybe a sarcastic comment isn't the most effective means of communication. But given the quality of the root comment I felt it appropriate. Here. Let me paste a blurb by Richard Posner from An Economic Analysis of Copyright Law. Copyright law is not the same as patent law, of course. But the balance being sought is much the same. "A distinguishing characteristic of intellectual property is its "public good" aspect. While the cost of creating a work subject to copyright protection—for example, a book, movie, song, ballet, lithograph, map, business directory, or computer software program—is often high, the cost of reproducing the work, whether by the creator or by those to whom he has made it available, is often low. And once copies are available to others, it is often inexpensive for these users to make additional copies. If the copies made by the creator of the work are priced at or close to marginal cost, others may be discouraged from making copies, but the creator’s total revenues may not be sufficient to cover the cost of creating the work. Copyright protection—the right of the copyright’s owner to prevent others from making copies—trades off the costs of limiting access to a work against the benefits of providing incentives to create the work in the first place. Striking the correct balance between access and incentives is the central problem in copyright law. For copyright law to promote economic efficiency, its principal legal doctrines must, at least approximately, maximize the benefits from creating additional works minus both the losses from limiting access and the costs of administering copyright protection."
  - srtjstjsj 10y ago
    Posner says nothing about public vs private funding, and says nothing about alternatives to copyight protection. Your follow-up post is another non-sequitur

The irony of someone being sarcastic about DoD research while communicating on a medium that was a direct result of DoD research is pretty funny :)

whorleater 10y ago
The internet being a result of DoD research doesn't make them impervious to criticism.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

sctb 10y ago

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12189499 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12189499 and marked it non sequitur.

forrestthewoods 10y ago
What? That's absurd. It's not a non-sequitur. It's a statement that massive government research projects are exceptionally overpriced and inefficient. Maybe a sarcastic comment isn't the most effective means of communication. But given the quality of the root comment I felt it appropriate. Here. Let me paste a blurb by Richard Posner from An Economic Analysis of Copyright Law. Copyright law is not the same as patent law, of course. But the balance being sought is much the same. "A distinguishing characteristic of intellectual property is its "public good" aspect. While the cost of creating a work subject to copyright protection—for example, a book, movie, song, ballet, lithograph, map, business directory, or computer software program—is often high, the cost of reproducing the work, whether by the creator or by those to whom he has made it available, is often low. And once copies are available to others, it is often inexpensive for these users to make additional copies. If the copies made by the creator of the work are priced at or close to marginal cost, others may be discouraged from making copies, but the creator’s total revenues may not be sufficient to cover the cost of creating the work. Copyright protection—the right of the copyright’s owner to prevent others from making copies—trades off the costs of limiting access to a work against the benefits of providing incentives to create the work in the first place. Striking the correct balance between access and incentives is the central problem in copyright law. For copyright law to promote economic efficiency, its principal legal doctrines must, at least approximately, maximize the benefits from creating additional works minus both the losses from limiting access and the costs of administering copyright protection."
- srtjstjsj 10y ago
  Posner says nothing about public vs private funding, and says nothing about alternatives to copyight protection. Your follow-up post is another non-sequitur