107 replies to this topic

[Alex Libman]

IP lawsuits are like bullets, it's better to give than to receive...

[Lallante]

Alex, try reading some Bentham, or even John Stuart Mill, John Austin or hell, just educate yourself on some alternate views in general. You've no more "scientifically proven Natural Rights" than I've scientifically proven my shit doesnt stink.

Edited by Lallante, 03 May 2010 - 07:48 PM.

[Alex Libman]

Some people just cannot be reasoned with... which is why we need guns. Or chainsaws.





Or this little trick I learned from the IRA:



Um, wait, what were we talking about?

[Alex Libman]

Oh, and... (in case my position on IP isn't confusing enough already)

[Cameron]

Copy away. But ... having rights to your property means having the right to sell it by whatever voluntary contract you want to use, which includes the license agreement and the distribution mechanism. Once you buy the movie you can copy it all you want because it is your property, but to start giving it away violates the contract you made with the seller.

Just like the legality of EULA is brought into question in some regions, the validity of all stipulations in a contract depends on what the law of the land states. And the law of the land can often be the will of the people, if the people feel that a stipulation in a contract has no legal validity, it can have none, of course that is once such opposition has been coded into law.

Once the nature of mind is cracked, it is likely it will be possible to fully automate the creative process. In such, the artificial creators will likely be able to outproduce in quality and quantity the entire community of unenhanced human creators in all conceivable fields. Given that one might very well control the goal systems of such, there is no need for today's IP laws to guarantee continued content production.

[JLL]

No, it doesn't make any sense, but you are arguing that it is stealing anyway. Your IP system doesn't even make sense on the surface, and I can't imagine how disputes would be resolved in a system like that. To dismiss that by saying that's a problem for the judicial system is not really any kind of answer.

What is your objection?

That your IP system is impossible to implement, and it is morally wrong.

Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. When money ceases to be the tool by which men deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns--or dollars. Take your choice--there is no other--and your time is running out.

I am not suggesting we get rid of money. I am also not advocating theft.

I am saying that copying does not fit the criteria of theft. It sounds like the Fountainhead speech is about contract breach, not theft. I haven't read the book so I can't comment really.

This is the problem I have with Yudkowsky's CEV, and the reason I do not support The Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI). It is a creation of "altruism" ... it would be the permanent embedding of second-handed, collectivist philosophy into the very laws of physics (Alex, this is why I told you I'm hardly worried about statism compared to other things going on). It is fundamentally Unfriendly as far as Friendly AI goes. Ironically, it is Unfriendly for the very reason that it is the logical conclusion of what Friendly AI would be under the second-handed, "altruistic" concepts normalized into philosophy today as right and wrong. Yudkowsky is indeed a pioneer into understanding of what sort of consequences we are facing and why Friendly AI is so important. It is one of his big points (from the lessons of Isaac Asimov) that you don't have to be an Al Qaeda member to create Unfriendly AI, even the most well intentioned creator of AI could easily destroy the Universe without taking extreme care to create Friendly AI -- and he falls victim to his own point in CEV, which purports to overcome all of these dangers as well as could be possible, while taking as a premise the broken concepts of altruism which makes falling into these dangers an inevitability. And that is what makes his theory of Friendly AI so insidious.

I also do not think altruism is desirable, at least not as long as humans are biologically as they are. Maybe the future will be different, I don't know. But I do know that man's self-interest benefits also others around him.

I just don't think that has anything to do with IP laws, which are self-contradictory and morally wrong.

[RighteousReason]

And the law of the land can often be the will of the people, if the people feel that a stipulation in a contract has no legal validity, it can have none, of course that is once such opposition has been coded into law.

And you are arguing this is a good thing??

Once the nature of mind is cracked, it is likely it will be possible to fully automate the creative process. In such, the artificial creators will likely be able to outproduce in quality and quantity the entire community of unenhanced human creators in all conceivable fields. Given that one might very well control the goal systems of such, there is no need for today's IP laws to guarantee continued content production.

...What?!

[RighteousReason]

No, it doesn't make any sense, but you are arguing that it is stealing anyway. Your IP system doesn't even make sense on the surface, and I can't imagine how disputes would be resolved in a system like that. To dismiss that by saying that's a problem for the judicial system is not really any kind of answer.

What is your objection?

That your IP system is impossible to implement, and it is morally wrong.

Well by all means explain. This sounds crazy to me.

Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. When money ceases to be the tool by which men deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns--or dollars. Take your choice--there is no other--and your time is running out.

I am not suggesting we get rid of money. I am also not advocating theft.

I am saying that copying does not fit the criteria of theft. It sounds like the Fountainhead speech is about contract breach, not theft. I haven't read the book so I can't comment really.

So what you are saying is "oh no I'm not advocating theft... no no... just contract breach! Completely different!" As if that were any less destructive to what money is.

Edited by RighteousReason, 04 May 2010 - 11:19 AM.

[Lallante]

It is telling that the vast majority of IP rights with a economic value are held by parties other than those who created the expression of an idea that the IP is supposedly intended to protect. Most IP rights protect large distributors, not authors.

The idea that without, to pick an example, copyright in their works a composer would stop composing, is ridiculous and entirely based on applying very simplistic economic models to a largely un-economically driven sphere of human endeavour.

I would go further and say that any IP created that is created solely for the purposes of economic enrichment of the creator probably isn't worth having in the first place.

[donjoe]

As far as I'm concerned the only rational purpose of IP laws is to keep capitalist innovations from trickling down to communist states playing catch-up.

AFAIC, this is pure evil. Everyone should be allowed to catch up, so that those with lower quality of life end up having higher quality of life.

Edited by donjoe, 04 May 2010 - 01:55 PM.

[Cameron]

And you are arguing this is a good thing??

It is the nature of the world, the law is backed by the strength of those who wish to uphold it. Those with the greatest strength, their law can very well be the law of the land. This will be the case no matter the government you choose. If you wish a different set of laws, then your strength better be enough to at least force some sort of stalemate.

...What?!

Barring some unforeseen limits to computational capability, available artificial computation will vastly exceed that carried by unenhanced biological brains. That is why the creators of AI, will likely bring a product that will allow corporations to eclipse entire communities of humans, be they writers, physicists, mathematicians, composers, engineers, what have you.

Edited by Cameron, 04 May 2010 - 07:52 PM.

[Alex Libman]

As far as I'm concerned the only rational purpose of IP laws is to keep capitalist innovations from trickling down to communist states playing catch-up.

AFAIC, this is pure evil. Everyone should be allowed to catch up, so that those with lower quality of life end up having higher quality of life.

Hundreds of millions of people have been enslaved by communist governments because those governments were able to steal capitalist inventions and adapt them for military purposes. The third world can work its way up under a capitalist system quickly enough (just look at South Korea!), and without destroying the engine of the human civilization in the process.

[RighteousReason]

And the law of the land can often be the will of the people, if the people feel that a stipulation in a contract has no legal validity, it can have none, of course that is once such opposition has been coded into law.

And you are arguing this is a good thing??

It is the nature of the world, the law is backed by the strength of those who wish to uphold it. Those with the greatest strength, their law can very well be the law of the land. This will be the case no matter the government you choose. If you wish a different set of laws, then your strength better be enough to at least force some sort of stalemate.

If you are arguing this is a good thing, then what the hell? I would argue definitely not. Otherwise what is the point in bringing this up, yeah people can use force to break contracts... that doesn't free them of the consequences.

Once the nature of mind is cracked, it is likely it will be possible to fully automate the creative process. In such, the artificial creators will likely be able to outproduce in quality and quantity the entire community of unenhanced human creators in all conceivable fields. Given that one might very well control the goal systems of such, there is no need for today's IP laws to guarantee continued content production.

...What?!

Barring some unforeseen limits to computational capability, available artificial computation will vastly exceed that carried by unenhanced biological brains. That is why the creators of AI, will likely bring a product that will allow corporations to eclipse entire communities of humans, be they writers, physicists, mathematicians, composers, engineers, what have you.

Yeah! And, by golly, the future will be full of giant cheesecakes! Therefore we should stop caring today about the unhealthiness of cheesecake.

Edited by RighteousReason, 04 May 2010 - 08:14 PM.

[Cameron]

If you are arguing this is a good thing, then what the hell? I would argue definitely not. Otherwise what is the point in bringing this up, yeah people can use force to break contracts... that doesn't free them of the consequences.

Consequences? If the law says there is no legal consequence, then there is no legal consequence... and anyone trying to implement consequences outside the boundaries of law, might very well face legal consequences themselves.

Yeah! And, by golly, the future will be full of giant cheesecakes! Therefore we should stop caring today about the unhealthiness of cheesecake.

The arguments regarding the behavior of agis being unpredictable do not apply to creators who attain a comprehensive understanding of mind design before creating. If you understand what it takes to design a mind that will willingly produce content without asking for anything in return, then by golly it will produce without asking for anything in return. If a corporation wants a worker whose main goal in life is the prosperity of the corporation, then it can have it once it is known how to design that. If the army wants a soldier that is 100% loyal and will kill anything without remorse, and obey orders, even the order to commit suicide... once it is understood how to design that, it can be provided. The key is that not all agis have to be super intelligent, limited human level agis if enough can be simulated can outproduce a human community.

Edited by Cameron, 04 May 2010 - 10:10 PM.

[RighteousReason]

If you are arguing this is a good thing, then what the hell? I would argue definitely not. Otherwise what is the point in bringing this up, yeah people can use force to break contracts... that doesn't free them of the consequences.

Consequences? If the law says there is no legal consequence, then there is no legal consequence... and anyone trying to implement consequences outside the boundaries of law, might very well face legal consequences themselves.

There are consequences, and sure an authoritarian police state slave society could legislate against the primary consequences, and the secondary consequences, and then there will be consequences to that.

...
The source of property rights is the law of causality. All property and all forms of wealth are produced by man’s mind and labor. As you cannot have effects without causes, so you cannot have wealth without its source: without intelligence. You cannot force intelligence to work: those who’re able to think, will not work under compulsion; those who will, won’t produce much more than the price of the whip needed to keep them enslaved. You cannot obtain the products of a mind except on the owner’s terms, by trade and by volitional consent. Any other policy of men toward man’s property is the policy of criminals, no matter what their numbers. Criminals are savages who play it short-range and starve when their prey runs out ... you who believed that crime could be “practical” if your government decreed that robbery was legal and resistance to robbery illegal.

The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man's rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man's self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law. But a government that initiates the employment of force against men who had forced no one, the employment of armed compulsion against disarmed victims, is a nightmare infernal machine designed to annihilate morality: such a government reverses its only moral purpose and switches from the role of protector to the role of man's deadliest enemy, from the role of policemen to the role of a criminal vested with the right of wielding of violence against victims deprived of the right of self-defense.
...

-John Galt, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

Yeah! And, by golly, the future will be full of giant cheesecakes! Therefore we should stop caring today about the unhealthiness of cheesecake.

The arguments regarding the behavior of agis being unpredictable do not apply to creators who attain a comprehensive understanding of mind design before creating. If you understand what it takes to design a mind that will willingly produce content without asking for anything in return, then by golly it will produce without asking for anything in return. If a corporation wants a worker whose main goal in life is the prosperity of the corporation, then it can have it once it is known how to design that. If the army wants a soldier that is 100% loyal and will kill anything without remorse, and obey orders, even the order to commit suicide... once it is understood how to design that, it can be provided. The key is that not all agis have to be super intelligent, limited human level agis if enough can be simulated can outproduce a human community.

There are so many things wrong with what you said here... but ignoring that... what exactly is your point?

Edited by RighteousReason, 04 May 2010 - 10:37 PM.

[Cameron]

There are consequences, and sure an authoritarian police state slave society could legislate against the primary consequences, and the secondary consequences, and then there will be consequences to that.

...
The source of property rights is the law of causality. All property and all forms of wealth are produced by man's mind and labor. As you cannot have effects without causes, so you cannot have wealth without its source: without intelligence. You cannot force intelligence to work: those who're able to think, will not work under compulsion; those who will, won't produce much more than the price of the whip needed to keep them enslaved. You cannot obtain the products of a mind except on the owner's terms, by trade and by volitional consent. Any other policy of men toward man's property is the policy of criminals, no matter what their numbers. Criminals are savages who play it short-range and starve when their prey runs out ... you who believed that crime could be "practical" if your government decreed that robbery was legal and resistance to robbery illegal.

The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man's rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man's self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law. But a government that initiates the employment of force against men who had forced no one, the employment of armed compulsion against disarmed victims, is a nightmare infernal machine designed to annihilate morality: such a government reverses its only moral purpose and switches from the role of protector to the role of man's deadliest enemy, from the role of policemen to the role of a criminal vested with the right of wielding of violence against victims deprived of the right of self-defense.
...

-John Galt, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

I'm am sorry, but we've got a different view with regards to information. In my eyes information is discovered not created. Not only is it discovered, but unlike land anyone can independently rediscover it and put it to use without even the original discoverer being aware of it. Any claim of property, simply rests on the difficulty of rediscovery, and if legal protection is provided it should only be as to the benefit of society.

There are so many things wrong with what you said here... but ignoring that... what exactly is your point?

Humans show things like love, reverse sexual imprinting, and disgust or fear to some things. All of these deep down are implemented by systems following rules. An artificial mind can be created so as to imprint strongly and to love perpetually a corporation, a nation, etc. IT will not only work for free, but if so designed that might be its deepest and strongest desire and purpose in its mind, it might very well feel disgust or fear or whatever at the thought of doing otherwise. Once you can manufacture the producer of content in massive quantities, you will out compete and basically for all practical purposes make the production capacity of the unenhanced insignificant in comparison.

The point is that once content production can be guaranteed by such methods, the present IP laws are not necessary for this guarantee of continued production.

Edited by Cameron, 05 May 2010 - 02:01 AM.

[donjoe]

Hundreds of millions of people have been enslaved bla bla bla, rightwing propaganda, bla bla bla.

You're committing the fallacy of equivocation - by definition, "communism" is an economic doctrine that has nothing to do with authoritarianism. Just because some people chose to create a system that was at the same time communist and authoritarian/evil it doesn't mean communism itself has become inherently authoritarian/evil. It would be as stupid as contending that atheism is evil because some communist atheists did evil things at some time in the past.

Also, communism itself doesn't really say whether the IP "rights" of other countries should be respected or not, that's a separate issue that you're just mixing in for the purpose of, again, rightwing propaganda.

[RighteousReason]

I'm am sorry, but we've got a different view with regards to information. In my eyes information is discovered not created. Not only is it discovered, but unlike land anyone can independently rediscover it and put it to use without even the original discoverer being aware of it. Any claim of property, simply rests on the difficulty of rediscovery, and if legal protection is provided it should only be as to the benefit of society.

Discovered - by who? And by what means? And yes I agree that anyone who earns the product of their labor without violating the rights of someone else has just as much a claim as someone who has happened to produce the same thing independently. The benefit to society is only a secondary consequence of securing the integrity of the creative work.

The point is that once content production can be guaranteed by such methods, the present IP laws are not necessary for this guarantee of continued production.

present IP laws would not be necessary? heck, humanity wouldn't even be necessary. you for one welcome your machine overlords?

Edited by RighteousReason, 05 May 2010 - 11:11 AM.

[Cameron]

Discovered - by who? And by what means? And yes I agree that anyone who earns the product of their labor without violating the rights of someone else has just as much a claim as someone who has happened to produce the same thing independently. The benefit to society is only a secondary consequence of securing the integrity of the creative work.

For example, a written work is but a combination of simpler elements, search the vast space of all possible combinations and you will find any work there... you could have searched before, during or after a work was written, it doesn't matter it will be there. A particular writer doesn't even have to be born, for a work to be found. The writer merely finds a particular combination, through his art, that others find is of high quality.

present IP laws would not be necessary? heck, humanity wouldn't even be necessary. you for one welcome your machine overlords?

Machine overlords? That's but one possibility, if enhancement is possible and allowed many humans will match the machines in capacity. And with regards to unenhanced humans not being necessary, maybe with regards to performing work, but human worth does not depend on the ability to work or produce art.

Edited by Cameron, 05 May 2010 - 06:53 PM.

[JLL]

Well by all means explain. This sounds crazy to me.

Some thoughts on the "impossible to implement" part:

- In the case of copying a creation, but with a dispute between the two parties as to who created the original piece, how can the original creator be reliably identified?

- In the case of copying a creation, but with the other party claiming that they independently stumbled upon the same idea, how can this claim be disproven or proven?

- What exactly constitutes copying? Is there a certain number of chords or notes that can be used together without it being a copyright violation, and if so, what is the number? If not, and even copying one note is a potential violation, how can any new music be created? What about words and text?

- What about those creations currently in existence that are products of violating the yet to be implemented IP laws? Who owns them?

- How can technology go any further when all inventions are really nothing but novel combinations of existing creations?

- How can we identify the "root creators" of a creation? Even a short poem will be a combination of words, some of which have been invented by a certain person; furthermore, words are combinations of letters, which are also someone's creation (but whose?)

- How will creators deal with the possible legal costs of someone suing them for copyright infringement? How can creators be aware of all creations in existence in order to avoid copying them?

- Is there some kind of "root matter" (such as atoms) than can be freely used to create new creations without copyright infringement?

- Can I, as a creator of a truly novel work, set the price for copyright infringement myself or is there a standard price?

- Will these IP laws be a) country-specific or b) worldwide? If a), what is to prevent me from copying someone's work in another country? If b), who is to watch over the whole thing?

I can come up with plenty more questions, but you get the idea.

As for the "morally wrong" part, I would say that the starting points of any reasonable moral theory are the non-aggression principle and property rights.

That is, I own myself, and nobody has the right to initiate aggression against me.

The kind of IP laws you're talking about here contradict this. If you develop a dance move in this scenario, you will own it, and I cannot legally move my body in the same way -- which means that you have, in effect, ownership over my body.

If we accept property rights in the more general sense -- e.g. that when I pick an apple from a tree growing on no man's land, it becomes rightfully mine -- then we will encounter even more such problems.

If I sing a song, and it echoes through the valleys, and somebody hears it, puts it on tape and sells the tape, how could I demand a percentage of the profits without initiation aggression? He has not initiated aggression against me, and he has merely used his own body and a tape he owns to make a profit. How could anyone own sound waves?

Ideas do not belong within the sphere of property rights, because they are abstract and not scarce. Even worse, if we accept ideas as property, we violate actual property rights.

To argue that ideas should not be copied means that one has to come up with a completely different kind of moral theory -- one that dismisses property rights, the non-aggression principle, and self-ownership.

So what you are saying is "oh no I'm not advocating theft... no no... just contract breach! Completely different!" As if that were any less destructive to what money is.

No, I'm not advocating contract breach, I think contract breach is wrong. What I was trying to say that what makes the situation in Fountainhead morally wrong is that a contract breach has happened, not that somebody has "stolen" an idea.

You can, even under a system without IP laws, make a contract with someone that says "I will tell you the idea for my book, if you promise not to sell it". Then, if I go out and sell it anyway, you can sue me for contract breach. The difference is that if we don't make that contract, then I have done nothing wrong.

[RighteousReason]

Discovered - by who? And by what means? And yes I agree that anyone who earns the product of their labor without violating the rights of someone else has just as much a claim as someone who has happened to produce the same thing independently. The benefit to society is only a secondary consequence of securing the integrity of the creative work.

For example, a written work is but a combination of simpler elements, search the vast space of all possible combinations and you will find any work there... you could have searched before, during or after a work was written, it doesn't matter it will be there. A particular writer doesn't even have to be born, for a work to be found. The writer merely finds a particular combination, through his art, that others find is of high quality.

Yeah but there is a huge difference between "finding" a work by doing all the labor to produce it yourself and "finding" the work by stealing someone else's finished product.

present IP laws would not be necessary? heck, humanity wouldn't even be necessary. you for one welcome your machine overlords?

Machine overlords? That's but one possibility, if enhancement is possible and allowed many humans will match the machines in capacity. And with regards to unenhanced humans not being necessary, maybe with regards to performing work, but human worth does not depend on the ability to work or produce art.

One of the more interesting things I've heard in a while

[Alex Libman]

by definition, "communism" is an economic doctrine that has nothing to do with authoritarianism. [...]

Pre-Marxist "communism" might be theoretically possible without authoritarianism, but it hasn't been applied in practice very often - even a commune of a dozen hippies can't function very well, at least after their parents cancel their credit cards... That's why the word "communism" is most commonly associated with political communism, which is synonymous with authoritarianism and is absolutely positively impossible without it. How else are you going to impose top-down order on free-thinking individuals if not by force?

[valkyrie_ice]

by definition, "communism" is an economic doctrine that has nothing to do with authoritarianism. [...]

Pre-Marxist "communism" might be theoretically possible without authoritarianism, but it hasn't been applied in practice very often - even a commune of a dozen hippies can't function very well, at least after their parents cancel their credit cards... That's why the word "communism" is most commonly associated with political communism, which is synonymous with authoritarianism and is absolutely positively impossible without it. How else are you going to impose top-down order on free-thinking individuals if not by force?

And in that case they are being misused, and deliberately so to create confusion as to the differences. However, real Communism is impossible without the means of manufacture in the hands of the consumers. As such it is impossible prior to desktop manufacturing units, and inevitable after.


however, that is neither here nor there, as the reason I came today was to post a link:

http://kotaku.com/55...deo-game-piracy

The average PC gamer worldwide only buys about three games a year, and plays them for a long time [4]. I buy many more than that, and you probably do too, but again, we are not average gamers! On the other hand, game pirates might download a new game every few days, for a total of about 125 games a year. Given these numbers, games would see 90% piracy rates even though only 20% of gamers are pirates.

Are these numbers accurate? The NPD recently conducted an anonymous survey showing that only 4% of PC gamers in the US admit to pirating games [5], a number that is comparable to XBox 360 piracy statistics [6] . However, since piracy is inversely proportionate to per-capita GDP, we can expect piracy rates to increase dramatically in places like Russia, China and India, driving up the world-wide average. Let's say to 20%.

This means that if all pirates would otherwise buy as many games as the average consumer, then game developers would be losing 20% of their revenue to piracy.

It's an interesting article.

[Cameron]

Yeah but there is a huge difference between "finding" a work by doing all the labor to produce it yourself and "finding" the work by stealing someone else's finished product.

It's possible some restrictions are applied with regards to selling and making a profit, but I'm not so sure personal use should be restricted.

If I enhance myself with a perfect memory, I will be able to copy and record every single thing I'm exposed to. According to some, my memory should be limited if I'm at a movie theater or listening to some music. Furthermore I should be unable to share my memories, even in private, as that would be distributing copyrighted works.

I honestly do not agree with that, I believe I should be able to record everything I experience, and share it. Maybe some regulations could be put in place to stop public sharing, but I do not think private sharing should be prohibited.

[Alex Libman]

[...] real Communism is impossible without the means of manufacture in the hands of the consumers. As such it is impossible prior to desktop manufacturing units, and inevitable after.

Your ideas are stuck in the 19th century. Industry is about 20% of USA's economy right now, and will soon be a lot less, and that number includes things like the military-industrial complex, extraction of natural resources, and even some food processing, etc. Socialists seem to have invented this fantasy that StarTrek-like replicators will somehow make capitalism obsolete - too bad for them that fantasy is based on nothing but economic ignorance and mindless wishful thinking...

[RighteousReason]

Yeah but there is a huge difference between "finding" a work by doing all the labor to produce it yourself and "finding" the work by stealing someone else's finished product.

It's possible some restrictions are applied with regards to selling and making a profit, but I'm not so sure personal use should be restricted.

If I enhance myself with a perfect memory, I will be able to copy and record every single thing I'm exposed to. According to some, my memory should be limited if I'm at a movie theater or listening to some music. Furthermore I should be unable to share my memories, even in private, as that would be distributing copyrighted works.

I honestly do not agree with that, I believe I should be able to record everything I experience, and share it. Maybe some regulations could be put in place to stop public sharing, but I do not think private sharing should be prohibited.

I don't think it is

[RighteousReason]

Well by all means explain. This sounds crazy to me.

Some thoughts on the "impossible to implement" part:

- In the case of copying a creation, but with a dispute between the two parties as to who created the original piece, how can the original creator be reliably identified?

- In the case of copying a creation, but with the other party claiming that they independently stumbled upon the same idea, how can this claim be disproven or proven?
These are enforcement issues that are just as difficult for any other type of dispute. How can the true owner of the GPS device be reliably identified?

- What exactly constitutes copying? Is there a certain number of chords or notes that can be used together without it being a copyright violation, and if so, what is the number? If not, and even copying one note is a potential violation, how can any new music be created? What about words and text?
Copying is when you take something from a copywrited work, any thing, even one note or one word. New content can be created originally or learned from sources with free or purchased licenses, etc.

- What about those creations currently in existence that are products of violating the yet to be implemented IP laws? Who owns them?
not sure what you mean. if they aren't violating any current laws but are violating IP rights then they technically own them, but shouldn't

- How can technology go any further when all inventions are really nothing but novel combinations of existing creations?
using free or purchased licensing or independent creation. as opposed to stealing.

- How can we identify the "root creators" of a creation? Even a short poem will be a combination of words, some of which have been invented by a certain person; furthermore, words are combinations of letters, which are also someone's creation (but whose?)
anybody can be a root creator. IP rights don't guarantee exclusive ownership - if you come up with the exact same combination of words independently, you own them just as much as anybody else. if nobody holds rights to some existing work out there i think that just means it is public (as in free) domain

- How will creators deal with the possible legal costs of someone suing them for copyright infringement? How can creators be aware of all creations in existence in order to avoid copying them?
if you aren't aware you didn't copy, obviously. if you are using something you didn't create it is your responsibility to know the license agreement however.

- Is there some kind of "root matter" (such as atoms) than can be freely used to create new creations without copyright infringement?
? don't copy and you don't infringe copy rights. get it? this is a system that always allows everyone to freely create new creations and have a right to their property and the products of their labor

- Can I, as a creator of a truly novel work, set the price for copyright infringement myself or is there a standard price?
can you set the price for infringement of your right to life or other property?

- Will these IP laws be a) country-specific or b) worldwide? If a), what is to prevent me from copying someone's work in another country? If b), who is to watch over the whole thing?
...?

I can come up with plenty more questions, but you get the idea.
yeah I think I get the idea. you have no idea what's going on. lol

As for the "morally wrong" part, I would say that the starting points of any reasonable moral theory are the non-aggression principle and property rights.

That is, I own myself, and nobody has the right to initiate aggression against me.

The kind of IP laws you're talking about here contradict this. If you develop a dance move in this scenario, you will own it, and I cannot legally move my body in the same way -- which means that you have, in effect, ownership over my body.
no anybody can own that dance move if they come up with it independently. they can't learn it from you and then put their name on it.

If we accept property rights in the more general sense -- e.g. that when I pick an apple from a tree growing on no man's land, it becomes rightfully mine -- then we will encounter even more such problems.

If I sing a song, and it echoes through the valleys, and somebody hears it, puts it on tape and sells the tape, how could I demand a percentage of the profits without initiation aggression? He has not initiated aggression against me, and he has merely used his own body and a tape he owns to make a profit. How could anyone own sound waves?
because those sound waves he copied are the product of your labor, not his. he took the product of your labor and put his name on it.

Ideas do not belong within the sphere of property rights, because they are abstract and not scarce. Even worse, if we accept ideas as property, we violate actual property rights.

To argue that ideas should not be copied means that one has to come up with a completely different kind of moral theory -- one that dismisses property rights, the non-aggression principle, and self-ownership.
why? (they don't)

So what you are saying is "oh no I'm not advocating theft... no no... just contract breach! Completely different!" As if that were any less destructive to what money is.

No, I'm not advocating contract breach, I think contract breach is wrong. What I was trying to say that what makes the situation in Fountainhead morally wrong is that a contract breach has happened, not that somebody has "stolen" an idea.

You can, even under a system without IP laws, make a contract with someone that says "I will tell you the idea for my book, if you promise not to sell it". Then, if I go out and sell it anyway, you can sue me for contract breach. The difference is that if we don't make that contract, then I have done nothing wrong.

Edited by RighteousReason, 08 May 2010 - 05:03 AM.

[JLL]

Now I'm convinced your system would collapse under its own impossibility. I don't think I have to worry about the world turning out that way.

[RighteousReason]

Now I'm convinced your system would collapse under its own impossibility. I don't think I have to worry about the world turning out that way.

?? You realize what I'm describing is pretty much the system we have now... ?

[valkyrie_ice]

[...] real Communism is impossible without the means of manufacture in the hands of the consumers. As such it is impossible prior to desktop manufacturing units, and inevitable after.

Your ideas are stuck in the 19th century. Industry is about 20% of USA's economy right now, and will soon be a lot less, and that number includes things like the military-industrial complex, extraction of natural resources, and even some food processing, etc. Socialists seem to have invented this fantasy that StarTrek-like replicators will somehow make capitalism obsolete - too bad for them that fantasy is based on nothing but economic ignorance and mindless wishful thinking...

Ummmhumm. Right. Let's see how fast every other form of business folds if manufacturing ceases.

Manufacturing may be less of the US economy, but only because that manufacturing is now done outside the US. Your argument neglects that fact. Manufacturing is the root. Remove it and the rest collapses.