[Mandrakeot] ESR gives up on Fedora

[Patrice Dumas]

On Fri, Feb 23, 2007 at 04:39:16AM -0500, Lyvim Xaphir wrote:
> 
> NOT if the intellectual property was produced by work that was not
> freely given.  If the programmer creates original product (IP) thru
> his/her own effort and work, then that person has the right to the
> fruits of that labor.  This is basic and not hard to understand.

The fact that freely available non rival goods maximize welfare
is also easy to understand. So here there is clearly a possible
opposition on normative issues. The political/ideological issue is 
on how to balance the freedom to license against welfare maximisation 
since both principles are antagonist in the case of non rival goods.

> Which I agree with in principle, with that statement taken by itself;
> but you are discussing a different type of regulation.  The situation
> I'm concerned with is when the programmer wishes to profit from his
> work; which is a form of regulation, but again I don't think that's what
> you mean here.

Indeed, what I call regulation here is what is commonly understood in 
the field of social choice economy. It is the action of a collective
body to set rules.

> My point is that if the person originates the work, then they
> automatically have the rights to that work, and as such they also have
> the intrinsic right to license it any way they like.  It's their work.
> It's their right. This right is forcibly taken from them in the case of
> forced licensing, which is presently occurring within the context of a
> false-freedom ideology.

You are saying that freedom to keep rights on intelectual production 
is the highest principle (above welfare maximization, at least). That's
a view, but other people may disagree. I am not stating my personnal view
here, just explaining that a way to understand this opposition is to 
state it that way.

> > Currently ideas cannot be protected, 
> 
> 
> This is your view and in my view it's false.  There are consequences
> today for stealing intellectual property and many people have felt the
> legal brunt of those consequences.  I don't agree with things like the

Ideas, knowledge cannot be protected. Reusing knowledge and ideas cannot
be prosecuted. The fields of intellectual property are innovation
(through patents), trademark, copyright (for art and software
representations), commercial secrets. Exceptions are entering now and 
then (like genetic codes, software patents that may protect some ideas 
that are not really innovations, informations stored in database), 
but basically all you read in a book cannot be protected by the book 
author. The copyright protects the wording, not the ideas.

--
Pat