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The term "intellectual property" was used in 1845 in Davoll et al. v. Brown, 173 years ago. The WIPO was created in 1967: 51 years ago. Whatever your personal
by tofof 8y ago
The term "intellectual property" was used in 1845 in Davoll et al. v. Brown, 173 years ago.
The WIPO was created in 1967: 51 years ago.
Whatever your personal objections are to a collective term for intangible human creations, claiming that "there is no such thing as intellectual property" is unhelpful to your cause, as that contention is simply absurd.
It is beyond belief that a cabal of lobbyists has convinced practically every nation on earth [1] to collectively supervise a nonexistence.
No, copyright/patent/trademark/trade secret/trade dress/design rights/moral rights/publicity rights/mask work rights/database rights/plant variety rights/geographical indications/etc(^) are not always detailed in separate laws. As early as 1916 the big three were grouped alike: see the Pan-American Convention's "Patents Trade Marks Copyright Status Report" and South Africa's "Patents, Designs, Trade Marks and Copyright Act" both in that year.
Yes, some separation exists for some of these ideas in some jurisdictions - US law separates copyright from trademark, for example, but not from moral rights, which are directly incorporated into copyright law in Title 17 USC. And no, you can't argue that copyright and moral rights are indistinguishable: even after assigning away copyright, an author retains the moral rights (e.g. right to attribution). And of course, the US also groups trade marks and patents together under the purview of the USPTO, and collectively joins invention rights (utility patents), plant variety rights, and design rights (design patents) all under the umbrella of 'patent law'.
Even where there is separation, that separation does not preclude the existence of a collective noun for the set. Nor does assignment into a collective set does imply a "rewrite of history". In fact, nearly all sets must be predated by at least one of their members; it would generally be nonsensical to create and name empty sets before any of their eventual members even exist.
In any case, arguing the merit of individual discussion is nonsequitous -- the existence of a collective name in no way precludes it.
Using your reasoning: "There simply is no such thing as the 'United States of America', nor are there any 'federal laws'. The term is perpetuated by proponents of the 'federal government'. It is a rewrite of history to pretend that that Virginia is somehow a subset of the USA -- the closest thing to what we would consider a state has existed since 1606 with the First Charter of Virginia in England. Native settlers of a similar area existed even further back than that.'
(^) Man, that's awkward. If only there was a term to denote that set that I just needed to name.
1: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a3/WIPO_members_2012.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a3/WIPO_members_...
- cyphar 8y agoI originally wrote a much longer response, where I argued that in order to group laws together they must have something in common -- and there is nothing that is obviously in common between copyright law, patent law, and trademark law. They all protect different things in different ways, and arguing that they "protect ideas" doesn't really get you anywhere (it doesn't help clarify much -- because in what way can ideas be protected -- and it also isn't really true because those laws protect specific things rather than a more nebulous concept of an idea). But I found that there is actually a section on the Wikipedia article for intellectual property that outlines the basic argument against the term[1]. I understand why you might find my argument silly on its face (of course people with much more stature than me have used the term "intellectual property" before, making it silly to argue that the term itself is not used anywhere of significance) -- but my main argument is that it is not really easy to come up with a single unifying idea behind "intellectual property laws". You can fairly easily come up with a unifying idea behind "fraud laws" (use of deception to profit in some fashion), or even just "property laws" (people who have a greater claim than anyone else to something are granted certain exclusive rights to it). But the fact that even the Wikipedia article for "intellectual property" cannot describe the concept without immediately breaking it down into the specific sub-rights leads me to believe that it is fairly hard to describe the common idea underlying copyright/patent/trademark laws. I was probably too forceful in my original response, which wasn't really fitting (since I actually agreed with the general point being made). > (^) Man, that's awkward. If only there was a term to denote that set that I just needed to name. I mean, my point is that the only time you need to name them together is when discussing "intellectual property". When it actually comes to filing a patent, or registering a trademark, or suing over a copyright infringement claim, you never would reference those laws together. I agree it's awkward, but I disagree that you would ever need to list them like that (because they are naturally separate concepts that aren't much more related than any other legal concept). [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#The_term_%22intellectual_property%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#The_term...
- tofof 8y agoI think what you're encountering is that most broad areas of law immediately break down into specific definitions and lists of rights. Examine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiralty_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiralty_law and see that in the opening summary the article similarly resorts to naming "marine commerce, marine navigation, salvage, maritime pollution, seafarers’ rights, and the carriage by sea of both passengers and goods" while distinguishing it from the Law of the Sea -- which is again immediately defined-by-list: "navigational rights, mineral rights, jurisdiction over coastal waters, and the maritime relationships between nations." Sadly, no, "most people" don't feel differently about these rights. In fact, most people cannot even differentiate one from another. This is certainly made no better by the growing use of the umbrella term, but is not caused by it. Search any online art site and find thousands of artists disclaiming "<character> is copyright <entity>", when in fact the only copyright in question is held by the author himself on the drawing he just drew. The artist intends to forswear the trademark, but cannot or at least does not distinguish these legal ideas. EDIT: Removed further arguments, because in actuality I agree with you (and this article). My original reaction was a kneejerk to your admittedly overstated claim of nonexistence. I too am concerned that greed-motivated lobbyists deliberately distort issues to strengthen intellectual property laws against the public interest. Your linked wikipedia section quotes Stallman and Lessig, as well as economists who would prefer the more descriptive term "intellectual monopoly", all objecting to to property's false implication of scarcity.