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Patent Attorney On Why We Need To Rethink Intellectual Property
Techdirt called our attention to an interesting video of patent attorney Stephan Kinsella's presentation on 'Rethinking Intellectual Property Completely.' It's a long presentation, but well worth the time to watch. There is also an ongoing series of posts discussing intellectual property rights on Techdirt for additional reading.
Yours is a naive comment. Imagine I invent a better mousetrap. It will save lives, reverse global warming, whatever. I start "MouseTraps Inc." and start manufacturing the mousetrap. The Acme corporation buys a copy of my invention, then using it's massive economy of scale drives me out of business. Sure, society benefits, but the inventor is harmed. Therefore, I am less willing to innovate.
If I invent something and sell at an outrageous prices, that's the market economy. If you don't want to pay $1,000; then don't buy it. Nobody is holding a gun to your head. You cite drugs as an example of outrageous cost that harms society. Do you realize that of the 40 years of prolonged life expectancy we've gained over the past century, 35 of those years are from sanitation? The other 5 are from clinical medicine.
Wouldn't it be better to live a better quality life than quality? Put more life into the years you have, rather than extend them. Besides, living a longer life puts a burden on Medicare and Social Security. The original idea of Social Security is most people wouldn't life long enough to enjoy it. That's not the case now. Medicare makes matters worse: you pay to help them live longer, then you pay because they are living longer.
What's worse is they are finding out that many of these great new drugs are not as effective than some generics.
On top of that, there's an article carping about the 6,666,666,666 billion people on the earth today. Three times the population 80 years ago. Six times the population of 1850. Twelve times the population of 1750. I should think prolonging life expectancy is counter-productive. Too many people puts a burden on our infrastructure. We have more cars because we have more people. We have more oil consumption because we have more people. Maybe we should wipe 5 billion off the map so we can have cheaper oil and clearer roads!
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
Aargh. I spent a half hour listening to this drivel. Next time, post a transcript.
Most of what he says is either trivial or a weird attempt to reconcile patent and copyright law with the writings of Ayn Rand.