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The issue is that the reach of IP is so incredibly wide. It makes sense that if you make a comic book about a superhero named Jumpman, printing presses shouldn
by Drakim 8y ago
The issue is that the reach of IP is so incredibly wide.
It makes sense that if you make a comic book about a superhero named Jumpman, printing presses shouldn't be able to just 1:1 copy your product and sell it. They also shoudln't be able to use your Jumpman character in their own works.
But we have moved so far that you can copyright generic things like the very concept of a comic book. Or having a HTML image that's also a link. Or having round corners on a mobile device.
The only reason we have anything public at all is because most of these inventions happened before the dawn of oppressive IP laws.
- dragonwriter 8y ago> But we have moved so far that you can copyright generic things like the very concept of a comic book. Or having a HTML image that's also a link. Or having round corners on a mobile device. You can't, in fact, copyright any of those things. Were they novel, the first two might be the kind of thing to qualify for utility patents, and the last is presumably a loose description of an actual Apple design patent.
- est31 8y ago> The issue is that the reach of IP is so incredibly wide. I fully agree. Software patents for example should be abolished, and we should get shorter terms on copyright (20 years after death of creator or 80 years after publication, whatever comes sooner would be a good choice). But the very basic concept of copyright and patent law is still good for the individual creators as well as the commons. Abolishing it does not benefit the creators in general, and only shifts power away from them.