6 ms·

Works are not ideas, they are expressions. Protecting ideas is insane.

Arainach 3y ago
I disagree. Protecting ideas for a limited duration is how you incentivize creation. If someone comes up with a new machine, why publish it if it's legal for every factory and large company to start producing them without compensating the inventor? Why sell it yourself if any big company can immediately clone it and undercut your price? As for "works", I also disagree. Consider music: two artists may have unique performances of a piece, but the composition exists separate from either.
- malwrar 3y ago
  > If someone comes up with a new machine, why publish it if it's legal for every factory and large company to start producing them without compensating the inventor? Why sell it yourself if any big company can immediately clone it and undercut your price? Because you want to make money? There will always be a period in which you exclusively are manufacturing and marketing your machine, before your hypothetical evil omni-corp manages to clone it. Reverse engineering takes time, and (fair, enforced) competition on manufacturing means that we converge on the true cost to manufacture a good faster.
  - Arainach 3y ago
    That period is a matter of hours. Unless you already own a plant, the companies that produce goods produce generic clones with the same tooling after hours. New fashion trends have clones in online stores in days. Unofficial accessories and cases are available before product launches. Crowdfunded campaigns for hardware have clones on Alibaba before the funding campaign is over.
- MightyBuzzard 3y ago
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- jwestbury 3y ago
  > If someone comes up with a new machine, why publish it if it's legal for every factory and large company to start producing them without compensating the inventor? Sure, this is the goal of the patent system. You'll note that patents are intended for inventions, for ideas of practical value. Artworks without practical value are explicitly not protected by the patent system, nor are ideas without the necessary design components. How would extending this system to ideas of pure form, rather than function, benefit society?

I disagree. Protecting ideas for a limited duration is how you incentivize creation. If someone comes up with a new machine, why publish it if it's legal for every factory and large company to start producing them without compensating the inventor? Why sell it yourself if any big company can immediately clone it and undercut your price? As for "works", I also disagree. Consider music: two artists may have unique performances of a piece, but the composition exists separate from either.

malwrar 3y ago
> If someone comes up with a new machine, why publish it if it's legal for every factory and large company to start producing them without compensating the inventor? Why sell it yourself if any big company can immediately clone it and undercut your price? Because you want to make money? There will always be a period in which you exclusively are manufacturing and marketing your machine, before your hypothetical evil omni-corp manages to clone it. Reverse engineering takes time, and (fair, enforced) competition on manufacturing means that we converge on the true cost to manufacture a good faster.
- Arainach 3y ago
  That period is a matter of hours. Unless you already own a plant, the companies that produce goods produce generic clones with the same tooling after hours. New fashion trends have clones in online stores in days. Unofficial accessories and cases are available before product launches. Crowdfunded campaigns for hardware have clones on Alibaba before the funding campaign is over.
MightyBuzzard 3y ago
[dead]
jwestbury 3y ago
> If someone comes up with a new machine, why publish it if it's legal for every factory and large company to start producing them without compensating the inventor? Sure, this is the goal of the patent system. You'll note that patents are intended for inventions, for ideas of practical value. Artworks without practical value are explicitly not protected by the patent system, nor are ideas without the necessary design components. How would extending this system to ideas of pure form, rather than function, benefit society?