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Being a big believer in Open Source and Freedom of Knowledge, I think we, as humans, would progress much more quickly if we broke down barriers to knowledge sha

Being a big believer in Open Source and Freedom of Knowledge, I think we, as humans, would progress much more quickly if we broke down barriers to knowledge sharing. It would help everyone progress much more quickly. Keeping knowledge secret, especially in research, which is usually publicly funded is not the right thing. We can debate all we want but the reality is that China has progressed and its people have benefitted through better living standards. Now those people are investing in other countries creating jobs and improving living standards across poor countries. Weirdly enough one such beneficiary has been India and African countries. Just 5 years ago India could not domestically manufacture cell phones. Now there are over 260 factories with 95% of the phones being produced in the country. This has been a big benefit to India and its people. Funny how that worked out? I am not sure what counts as "stealing" in terms of IP. I am a firm believer in protecting IP but at the same time you cannot argue that freely sharing knowledge has its own benefits. IP laws (especially patents) need to be revisited to make sure they serve their purpose and reasonably help inventors benefit from their inventions. Edit: I must also clarify that this goes both ways. The way Chinese don't end up sharing knowledge is bad. They also do not respect IP law and contracts which needs to drastically change. If they would have respected those and given a fair playing field for foreign companies, I don't think this would be a big issue today.

Brain_Thief 8y ago
I agree with the general spirit of what you're stating, but the fact of the matter is that the Chinese government has proven conclusively that its vision of the future is not one that incorporates a free flow of information or the preservation of individual rights; the Chinese government as an entity is not a viable partner in the task of building the society of free information you envision - it is an obstacle standing in the way. Unfortunately, the Chinese government has chosen to use its economic prosperity to brutally subjugate ethnic minorities and construct an authoritarian nightmare that fully realizes Orwell's visions of state rule [1]. Every bit of available data indicates that the Chinese government would censor you and everyone you know if it had the ability to do so; the ruling party have demonstrated their willingness to violently destroy any person, group, or ideology that they disapprove of. Any other assessment of the situation is, at best, naive to the point of being dangerous. The twentieth century (not to mention the past ten years) has taught us that democracy is a fragile thing; it is extremely important that western citizens be vigilant and open-eyed when assessing who to deal with in educational, political, and business theaters. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/04/world/asia/xinjiang-china-surveillance-prison.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/04/world/asia/xi...
- chrischen 8y ago
  Individual rights is a Western philosophy. Eastern philosophies have long favored collectivism, including the “free” Japan.
  - Brain_Thief 8y ago
    I've read your comment several times and am having trouble understanding your underlying point - could you elaborate?
    - automatic_4_ppl 8y ago
      It's a common apologia tactic for authoritarian regimes, in which their authoritarianism is justified by saying that, actually, that particular ethnicity prefers to be ruled by an iron-fisted dictatorship. Basically, the structure and ideology of the regime is assumed to be the authentic expression of something inherent in that particular culture, rather than the product of material circumstances or deliberate choices by a political elite.
    - nickpsecurity 8y ago
      Chinese culture encourages sharing ideas, not copyrighting ownership. Some things I've read say it comes from Confucianism. Regardless, they think it's good to spread and remix existing ideas instead of giving one party exclusive rights for 20-100+ years for their own profit. I agree with them that sharing ideas and tech seems to be a better default. If we had protections, they should be much more selective and careful. In Shenzhen especially, you have to out-compete the others on implementation of ideas instead of rest on your laurels (err, copyrights and patents). Wired has a great documentary of its history and culture here with examples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGJ5cZnoodY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGJ5cZnoodY One I like that's about improvement more than stealing is the iPhone copy. That company got the copy out about a year before the iPhone hit China. Apple refused to let customers swap their batteries and SIM cards easily. Their I.P. protections let them pull bullshit like that. The Chinese knockoff did let you swap those. The chargers come to mind, too. If your interface is proprietary, a company will likely spring up offering a modified product or cheaper adapter that lets people keep their existing one.
Daniel3 8y ago
Really? Blatantly ignoring patent laws, IP, international waters, the sovereignty of other countries, as well as their well documented strong arm capitalism-for-the-sake-of imperialism, like their infrastructure projects in Sri Lanka and other places for the purpose of bankruptcy is just seeking the common good? Its very funny to me how you praise them for championing "open source" philosophy with other people's IP etc... adn then at the end of your statement wonder allowed about them not sharing any of their own. Uh, thats not "open source" thats imperialism by any and all means. Disclaimer: Im not trying to paint this onto China as an entirety or as a culture. There are government forces at work, as well as private entities supporting and abetting this behavior for the purpose of Chinese Imperialism. There are good people and good institutions in China, unfortunately they are not the winds of progress there currently
- nickpsecurity 8y ago
  "Its very funny to me how you praise them for championing "open source" philosophy with other people's IP etc... adn then at the end of your statement wonder allowed about them not sharing any of their own. Uh, thats not "open source" thats imperialism by any and all means. " Yeah, it's not the same as open source. They certainly don't give anything out like in open-source. Your comment is misleading, though. The Chinese companies, which include lots of competitors internal to China, just copy everything in their process of iterating products out. So, Chinese companies and/or government takes the I.P., create their own products, and other Chinese copy them. All this stuff keeps spreading cheaper and getting forked kind of like open source. Hits overcharging, proprietary suppliers hard like open source. Just isn't open source with the full benefits.

Brain_Thief 8y ago

I agree with the general spirit of what you're stating, but the fact of the matter is that the Chinese government has proven conclusively that its vision of the future is not one that incorporates a free flow of information or the preservation of individual rights; the Chinese government as an entity is not a viable partner in the task of building the society of free information you envision - it is an obstacle standing in the way. Unfortunately, the Chinese government has chosen to use its economic prosperity to brutally subjugate ethnic minorities and construct an authoritarian nightmare that fully realizes Orwell's visions of state rule [1]. Every bit of available data indicates that the Chinese government would censor you and everyone you know if it had the ability to do so; the ruling party have demonstrated their willingness to violently destroy any person, group, or ideology that they disapprove of. Any other assessment of the situation is, at best, naive to the point of being dangerous. The twentieth century (not to mention the past ten years) has taught us that democracy is a fragile thing; it is extremely important that western citizens be vigilant and open-eyed when assessing who to deal with in educational, political, and business theaters. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/04/world/asia/xinjiang-china-surveillance-prison.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/04/04/world/asia/xi...

chrischen 8y ago
Individual rights is a Western philosophy. Eastern philosophies have long favored collectivism, including the “free” Japan.
- Brain_Thief 8y ago
  I've read your comment several times and am having trouble understanding your underlying point - could you elaborate?
  - automatic_4_ppl 8y ago
    It's a common apologia tactic for authoritarian regimes, in which their authoritarianism is justified by saying that, actually, that particular ethnicity prefers to be ruled by an iron-fisted dictatorship. Basically, the structure and ideology of the regime is assumed to be the authentic expression of something inherent in that particular culture, rather than the product of material circumstances or deliberate choices by a political elite.
  - nickpsecurity 8y ago
    Chinese culture encourages sharing ideas, not copyrighting ownership. Some things I've read say it comes from Confucianism. Regardless, they think it's good to spread and remix existing ideas instead of giving one party exclusive rights for 20-100+ years for their own profit. I agree with them that sharing ideas and tech seems to be a better default. If we had protections, they should be much more selective and careful. In Shenzhen especially, you have to out-compete the others on implementation of ideas instead of rest on your laurels (err, copyrights and patents). Wired has a great documentary of its history and culture here with examples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGJ5cZnoodY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGJ5cZnoodY One I like that's about improvement more than stealing is the iPhone copy. That company got the copy out about a year before the iPhone hit China. Apple refused to let customers swap their batteries and SIM cards easily. Their I.P. protections let them pull bullshit like that. The Chinese knockoff did let you swap those. The chargers come to mind, too. If your interface is proprietary, a company will likely spring up offering a modified product or cheaper adapter that lets people keep their existing one.

Daniel3 8y ago

Really? Blatantly ignoring patent laws, IP, international waters, the sovereignty of other countries, as well as their well documented strong arm capitalism-for-the-sake-of imperialism, like their infrastructure projects in Sri Lanka and other places for the purpose of bankruptcy is just seeking the common good? Its very funny to me how you praise them for championing "open source" philosophy with other people's IP etc... adn then at the end of your statement wonder allowed about them not sharing any of their own. Uh, thats not "open source" thats imperialism by any and all means. Disclaimer: Im not trying to paint this onto China as an entirety or as a culture. There are government forces at work, as well as private entities supporting and abetting this behavior for the purpose of Chinese Imperialism. There are good people and good institutions in China, unfortunately they are not the winds of progress there currently

nickpsecurity 8y ago
"Its very funny to me how you praise them for championing "open source" philosophy with other people's IP etc... adn then at the end of your statement wonder allowed about them not sharing any of their own. Uh, thats not "open source" thats imperialism by any and all means. " Yeah, it's not the same as open source. They certainly don't give anything out like in open-source. Your comment is misleading, though. The Chinese companies, which include lots of competitors internal to China, just copy everything in their process of iterating products out. So, Chinese companies and/or government takes the I.P., create their own products, and other Chinese copy them. All this stuff keeps spreading cheaper and getting forked kind of like open source. Hits overcharging, proprietary suppliers hard like open source. Just isn't open source with the full benefits.