5 ms·

>> if you're a seed company from a poor country you can get the license for golden rice (extra Vitamin A) for free, not the seeds themselves, you have to make t

>> if you're a seed company from a poor country you can get the license for golden rice (extra Vitamin A) for free, not the seeds themselves, you have to make those. How convenient....what about not paying any license at all regardless of the "golden" seeds you produce?

yorwba 9y ago
Presumably the idea is to have seed companies who can afford the license pay for the R & D cost so that it can be subsidized for poorer countries.
- thefounder 9y ago
  I see it more like enslaving poorer countries to always pay licenses(as much as they can). These poor countries will always be at the mercy of some corporations. I don't see how they could ever develop their own seeds if the licensors increase the license price. See the "pharma bro" case (Martin Shkreli). I bet the U.S. gov wouldn't be that upset if the customers were from a shwhole country.
  - yorwba 9y ago
    How do free licenses enslave poor countries to always pay licenses?
    - ZeroGravitas 9y ago
      "the first hit is always free" Who decides when they need to start paying and what thought process do they apply to that decision? Profit maximisation probably involves putting alternatives out of business first. Similar to how Microsoft and Adobe we're okay with piracy in developing nations on the basis it would kill competition and they'd get paid later.
    - manicdee 9y ago
      Are the free licences perpetual or time limited? Is Darth Vader going to alter the deal further?
- jacquesm 9y ago
  No, the idea is to expand the rent-seeking on copyrights and patents to staple foods.
  - yorwba 9y ago
    AFAIK, Golden Rice is a spin-off from university research and not owned by the big agriculture companies, so I think you are wrong in at least this instance. It's really no different from Qt being available both under the GPL and a less restrictive commercial license. Sure, gene patents and proprietary software are both manifest evil, but not everyone working within the existing framework is acting maliciously.
    - jacquesm 9y ago
      That's an exceptional situation in that they determined that they weren't going to be making money on it so they instead turned it in to a pro-GMO PR exercise. Read more on this here: http://www.goldenrice.org/Content1-Who/who4_IP.php http://www.goldenrice.org/Content1-Who/who4_IP.php So your claims about ownership appear to be false, and you still need a license.
      - yorwba 9y ago
        I'm not sure about the "not making money" -> "use it as PR" causality. From that website, it reads like the researchers retained the right to make it available to poorer countries when they sold the patent, i.e. before Syngenta found that they wouldn't be making money with it. So I don't think it is fair to accuse them (the researchers) of only doing it for the PR.
        makomk 9y ago
        As well as the researchers' patent, actually growing golden rice requires licences for a thicket of patents on the underlying technology from dozens of companies (and it required some wrangling to even get permission to license that patent for free since the government grants they got would usually require commercial licensing). They managed to get free licenses to those as, basically, a PR exercise - it was worth it to all those companies to do it because it let them spin opponents of their profitable products as monsters who wanted third world people to suffer. The licenses also had conditions that made them basically unusable, so if someone did miraculously manage to make golden rice viable they didn't have to worry about losing out on their cut.

yorwba 9y ago

Presumably the idea is to have seed companies who can afford the license pay for the R & D cost so that it can be subsidized for poorer countries.

thefounder 9y ago
I see it more like enslaving poorer countries to always pay licenses(as much as they can). These poor countries will always be at the mercy of some corporations. I don't see how they could ever develop their own seeds if the licensors increase the license price. See the "pharma bro" case (Martin Shkreli). I bet the U.S. gov wouldn't be that upset if the customers were from a shwhole country.
- yorwba 9y ago
  How do free licenses enslave poor countries to always pay licenses?
  - ZeroGravitas 9y ago
    "the first hit is always free" Who decides when they need to start paying and what thought process do they apply to that decision? Profit maximisation probably involves putting alternatives out of business first. Similar to how Microsoft and Adobe we're okay with piracy in developing nations on the basis it would kill competition and they'd get paid later.
  - manicdee 9y ago
    Are the free licences perpetual or time limited? Is Darth Vader going to alter the deal further?
jacquesm 9y ago
No, the idea is to expand the rent-seeking on copyrights and patents to staple foods.
- yorwba 9y ago
  AFAIK, Golden Rice is a spin-off from university research and not owned by the big agriculture companies, so I think you are wrong in at least this instance. It's really no different from Qt being available both under the GPL and a less restrictive commercial license. Sure, gene patents and proprietary software are both manifest evil, but not everyone working within the existing framework is acting maliciously.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    That's an exceptional situation in that they determined that they weren't going to be making money on it so they instead turned it in to a pro-GMO PR exercise. Read more on this here: http://www.goldenrice.org/Content1-Who/who4_IP.php http://www.goldenrice.org/Content1-Who/who4_IP.php So your claims about ownership appear to be false, and you still need a license.
    - yorwba 9y ago
      I'm not sure about the "not making money" -> "use it as PR" causality. From that website, it reads like the researchers retained the right to make it available to poorer countries when they sold the patent, i.e. before Syngenta found that they wouldn't be making money with it. So I don't think it is fair to accuse them (the researchers) of only doing it for the PR.
      - makomk 9y ago
        As well as the researchers' patent, actually growing golden rice requires licences for a thicket of patents on the underlying technology from dozens of companies (and it required some wrangling to even get permission to license that patent for free since the government grants they got would usually require commercial licensing). They managed to get free licenses to those as, basically, a PR exercise - it was worth it to all those companies to do it because it let them spin opponents of their profitable products as monsters who wanted third world people to suffer. The licenses also had conditions that made them basically unusable, so if someone did miraculously manage to make golden rice viable they didn't have to worry about losing out on their cut.