I run SETI@home. There's a bunch of biotech, math, and encryption projects that don't interest me much. What are some distributed projects in other categories? I used to run evolution@home, any others?
I'd love to see somebody with access to the trial submit that and see what it gets. But if I were a computer, you'd lose points for lack of an attention-getter and transitions. Add "Did you ever wonder of what a good essay always consists?" to the first paragraph, and "First," "In addition," and "Finally," to the second, third, and fourth paragraphs respectively.
I'm beginning to see where you're coming from. With the definition of property as fruits of labor, original works are property. I was thinking more in terms of property rights as the set of legal powers the government grants, and saying they needn't be the same for physical and intellectual property. So I can accept that creative works are natural property, as long as it doesn't follow that the government's protection of them should be limitless and perpetual.
Your weapons-grade plutonium example is quite apt - that's how software patents are often used in the computer industry today, and why I think they should be limited.
You only rephrased your assumption as a rhetorical question, but I'll still try to answer it. The "natural rights" of property are dependant on the conservation of mass and energy, a law we cannot change. That simply is not the case with any form of intellectual "property," so the line is drawn there. Any scarcity associated with existing creative works is artificial and mutable, and we apparently disagree as to how scarce our governments should make them.
On one extreme, we could eliminate scarcity, for example by abolishing copyright law. This would clearly lower the cost of existing creative works, but it would remove the profit motive for creators. On the other extreme, we could make complete scarcity, for example by making patents perpetual and very strong. The profit motive would then be strong, but it would be more difficult to create, fewer people could afford the works, and their market would suffer. I think the ideal level is somewhere in the middle, and it varies between industries and with different types of creative works.
In meatspace, we cannot change the scarcity, so we have no choice but to adapt our laws to it. We do this with "property" - limited, revocable, and transferable but otherwise exclusive and perputal control of the object owned. But those aspects of the right symbolized by the word "property" are seperable, and we are not required to choose between applying either none or all of them to creative works. Creative works and physical property are different, so the rights of creators and property owners need not be identical.
I don't think computer control is practical in the short term. It's very difficult from a software standpoint (we can't even make street-legal computerized non-flying cars). And from a liability standpoint, a computer control system is much harder to sell. If a human-controlled machine crashes, it was probably the human's fault. If a computer-controlled machine crashes, the company that made it is sure to be the one sued.
All your arguments are based on your conjecture that copyrights and patents are fundamental, perpetual, and exclusive rights on the same level as the rights to life, liberty, and physical property. How do you justify that?
They do not allow you to download music in an MP3 format for convenient dumping into your Kazaa directory, but life is full of compromises.
When will you people get it through your head that there are reasons besides piracy to want music in non-crippled formats? What would you gain by distributing the music you paid for for free? Is it possible you just want to play it on something besides an iPod, Windows PC or Mac? And most importantly, why don't consumers even have the choice of buying music a non-crippled file format?
Actually, no. He wasn't patenting the idea of having things glow when you put current through them (It's not just that, you can vary the current with time!), he was patenting using carbonized cotton or tungsten, and putting it in a vacucanum or an inert gas, and how much current and voltage to use - information that he gained through a large investment of time and materials, not through a dream after being hit in the head with a clock. The software equivalent would be source code, not interface patents, and nobody's contesting the protectability (with copyright) of that.
So what? Specific or general, it's still an idea they're patenting, and patents law specifically forbids that. If they were patenting the method to do it, they would be patenting source code. But couldn't they just copyright it then?
So yeah, patents were created to "incite" (what the living hell made you choose that word?) inventors to invent.
No, the inventors invented anyway. "To invent" and "to explain your invention" are two very different ideas; please don't equate them.
Patents were created so inventors explained their invention.
True. That's the beauty of the system. The system of which so many posters here call vehemently for the abolition.
As I understand it, one should be able to replicate the invention with the information in the patent. Mechanical patents include technical drawings. Bioengineering patents include molecular structures and synthesis methods. Shouldn't software patents therefore include source code?
Because it's Windows's completely braindead design that requires print drivers to run in ring 0, and that requires you to install special drivers for a remote printer. Printer drivers should run in user space, and should provide a non-printer-specific API to the network.
Back when I had an integrated sound card that did that, I noticed that interrupt activity did it. HD usage sounded one way, and USB usage had a distinct sound. So moving the mouse caused a low frequency buzz. It could be that.
It doesn't cost much to view a patent, but there is no limit on the cost to implement that patent. Patent holders aren't obligated to license the patents, and if they do, they can charge whatever they want. (Granted Microsoft would have antitrust limits, but that doesn't help small companies or projects.)
Currently you often must reverse engineer formats, but once you do, you're free to distribute your compatible software. With patents, you could get the specs for a nominal fee. But they might be obfuscated (patent offices aren't well-funded enough to prevent this), and licenses, if they're even being sold, might be incredibly expensive. And even if you only reverse engineered the format, instead of checking the patent, you'd still be infringing it.
Even incredibly complex data structures shouldn't be patentable. If they were, for example, Microsoft could patent Office formats and nobody else could write compatible software. The market would get even less competitive, and with no real advantage.
The theoretical benefit of patents is that companies would publish their formats. But in practice, patents aren't very helpful to someone else implementing the format, especially if the patents were never intended to be licensed. Data format patents would be used primarily to expand monopolies - any company with over 50% market share could benefit from limiting interoperability with competing products. This would be bad enough to offset the potential gains, and much worse than the status quo. At least now, though reverse engineering is difficult, you are allowed to use what you learn.
There's probably nothing illegal about it, but it's a bit dishonest, and unfair to OpenOffice.org, to not mention what it actually is. Frankly, I'm amazed at how many people bought it, how many gave good feedback, and that nobody identified it in the feedback.
When installing OpenOffice, it's hard not to notice that it's open source. ("Did you know that you can get help from the community?"...) So even people who would buy such an nondescript product would be pleasantly surprised.
Sure they could, but why would they? I just don't see how it would be in Google's interest to keep people from selling their names. It's free publicity.
There's not a one to one mapping between protocol and software. I'm not arguing that their client or server software is public domain, I'm just saying that there's nothing wrong with someone else making separate software that also speaks that protocol (unless it's patented, or info about the protocol was obtained illegally).
You bring up a separate issue, whether software can lie about its identity to communicate with a public server. I think making this illegal is also dangerous - faking user agent tags would be illegal. You would create a monopoly right with no societal benefit. Even if it were illegal, P2P software could ship with a cache of non-Sharman servers. And besides, the user (especially if you believe EULAs are binding) would be responsible, not the author of the software.
to take advantage of new features in iTunes 4.5 and the iTunes Music Store.
Ooh, I can't wait to take advantage of the new features! Like, PlayFair no longer works. Yay! I'll never have to boot Windows again. Unless I want to play my music. I can't wait.
It's not that simple. Suppose I make a piece of software which can communicate, using a certain protocol, with other software over the Internet. Do I therefore have a monopoly on the use of that protocol?
Assuming there are no patents involved in the protocol, no trade secret was illegally obtained, no trademark was violated, no software was copied, and no celebrity's persona was damaged, I don't have any exclusive right to the use of that protocol. It's very dangerous to create such a powerful exclusive right entirely without precedent.
You give examples, but they are not precedent. Porn sites can require payment, and violating that may be copyright infringement, and if you used somebody's password or credit card, fraud. People can ban specific IPs because they can do whatever they want with routers they own. Slashdot can have subscriber-specific content, but it can't C&D other websites because they use HTTP. In none of those cases does anyone have an exclusive right to use the protocol they created over transports they don't own.
If Mosaic had a protocolright on HTTP, would the Web exist? Protocolrights don't exist, and that's a good thing.
Slashdot Mirror
I run SETI@home. There's a bunch of biotech, math, and encryption projects that don't interest me much. What are some distributed projects in other categories? I used to run evolution@home, any others?
Honest question: Would Mickey Mouse shorten copyright terms in order to free himself from Disney's bondage, or does he like it?
I'd love to see somebody with access to the trial submit that and see what it gets. But if I were a computer, you'd lose points for lack of an attention-getter and transitions. Add "Did you ever wonder of what a good essay always consists?" to the first paragraph, and "First," "In addition," and "Finally," to the second, third, and fourth paragraphs respectively.
That would actually be a good idea: a Bayesian filter, trained on previous +5 comments, to moderate. linux riaa vorbis grits micro$oft profit.
While I really wish that were the case, it isn't. Nothing's stopping us from pretending like it is as a wussy form of civil protest, though.
Your weapons-grade plutonium example is quite apt - that's how software patents are often used in the computer industry today, and why I think they should be limited.
On one extreme, we could eliminate scarcity, for example by abolishing copyright law. This would clearly lower the cost of existing creative works, but it would remove the profit motive for creators. On the other extreme, we could make complete scarcity, for example by making patents perpetual and very strong. The profit motive would then be strong, but it would be more difficult to create, fewer people could afford the works, and their market would suffer. I think the ideal level is somewhere in the middle, and it varies between industries and with different types of creative works.
In meatspace, we cannot change the scarcity, so we have no choice but to adapt our laws to it. We do this with "property" - limited, revocable, and transferable but otherwise exclusive and perputal control of the object owned. But those aspects of the right symbolized by the word "property" are seperable, and we are not required to choose between applying either none or all of them to creative works. Creative works and physical property are different, so the rights of creators and property owners need not be identical.
I don't think computer control is practical in the short term. It's very difficult from a software standpoint (we can't even make street-legal computerized non-flying cars). And from a liability standpoint, a computer control system is much harder to sell. If a human-controlled machine crashes, it was probably the human's fault. If a computer-controlled machine crashes, the company that made it is sure to be the one sued.
All your arguments are based on your conjecture that copyrights and patents are fundamental, perpetual, and exclusive rights on the same level as the rights to life, liberty, and physical property. How do you justify that?
When will you people get it through your head that there are reasons besides piracy to want music in non-crippled formats? What would you gain by distributing the music you paid for for free? Is it possible you just want to play it on something besides an iPod, Windows PC or Mac? And most importantly, why don't consumers even have the choice of buying music a non-crippled file format?
Actually, no. He wasn't patenting the idea of having things glow when you put current through them (It's not just that, you can vary the current with time!), he was patenting using carbonized cotton or tungsten, and putting it in a vacucanum or an inert gas, and how much current and voltage to use - information that he gained through a large investment of time and materials, not through a dream after being hit in the head with a clock. The software equivalent would be source code, not interface patents, and nobody's contesting the protectability (with copyright) of that.
So what? Specific or general, it's still an idea they're patenting, and patents law specifically forbids that. If they were patenting the method to do it, they would be patenting source code. But couldn't they just copyright it then?
So you're saying science, an intellectual commons if there ever was one, is wrong?
No, the inventors invented anyway. "To invent" and "to explain your invention" are two very different ideas; please don't equate them.
True. That's the beauty of the system. The system of which so many posters here call vehemently for the abolition.As I understand it, one should be able to replicate the invention with the information in the patent. Mechanical patents include technical drawings. Bioengineering patents include molecular structures and synthesis methods. Shouldn't software patents therefore include source code?
Because it's Windows's completely braindead design that requires print drivers to run in ring 0, and that requires you to install special drivers for a remote printer. Printer drivers should run in user space, and should provide a non-printer-specific API to the network.
It's very similar to the Segway, certainly in the same market, and it's name only differs by one letter. Surely Segway's lawyers won't be happy.
Nowadays that's implied.
Back when I had an integrated sound card that did that, I noticed that interrupt activity did it. HD usage sounded one way, and USB usage had a distinct sound. So moving the mouse caused a low frequency buzz. It could be that.
Currently you often must reverse engineer formats, but once you do, you're free to distribute your compatible software. With patents, you could get the specs for a nominal fee. But they might be obfuscated (patent offices aren't well-funded enough to prevent this), and licenses, if they're even being sold, might be incredibly expensive. And even if you only reverse engineered the format, instead of checking the patent, you'd still be infringing it.
The theoretical benefit of patents is that companies would publish their formats. But in practice, patents aren't very helpful to someone else implementing the format, especially if the patents were never intended to be licensed. Data format patents would be used primarily to expand monopolies - any company with over 50% market share could benefit from limiting interoperability with competing products. This would be bad enough to offset the potential gains, and much worse than the status quo. At least now, though reverse engineering is difficult, you are allowed to use what you learn.
When installing OpenOffice, it's hard not to notice that it's open source. ("Did you know that you can get help from the community?"...) So even people who would buy such an nondescript product would be pleasantly surprised.
Sure they could, but why would they? I just don't see how it would be in Google's interest to keep people from selling their names. It's free publicity.
You bring up a separate issue, whether software can lie about its identity to communicate with a public server. I think making this illegal is also dangerous - faking user agent tags would be illegal. You would create a monopoly right with no societal benefit. Even if it were illegal, P2P software could ship with a cache of non-Sharman servers. And besides, the user (especially if you believe EULAs are binding) would be responsible, not the author of the software.
Ooh, I can't wait to take advantage of the new features! Like, PlayFair no longer works. Yay! I'll never have to boot Windows again. Unless I want to play my music. I can't wait.
Assuming there are no patents involved in the protocol, no trade secret was illegally obtained, no trademark was violated, no software was copied, and no celebrity's persona was damaged, I don't have any exclusive right to the use of that protocol. It's very dangerous to create such a powerful exclusive right entirely without precedent.
You give examples, but they are not precedent. Porn sites can require payment, and violating that may be copyright infringement, and if you used somebody's password or credit card, fraud. People can ban specific IPs because they can do whatever they want with routers they own. Slashdot can have subscriber-specific content, but it can't C&D other websites because they use HTTP. In none of those cases does anyone have an exclusive right to use the protocol they created over transports they don't own.
If Mosaic had a protocolright on HTTP, would the Web exist? Protocolrights don't exist, and that's a good thing.