[758] in libertarians
Re: Zimmerman case
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (sethf@MIT.EDU)
Fri Feb 24 22:22:23 1995
From: sethf@MIT.EDU
Date: Fri, 24 Feb 1995 22:21:30 -0500
To: theobald@duke.cs.mcgill.ca
Cc: libertarians@MIT.EDU
> So if you believe that intellectual property is an attempt "to thwart
> competition," how would eliminating it increase competition?
Because someone who can produce a cheaper or better product
would not be forbidden to do so. This is a similar argument as
anti-tariff, it's obvious.
> Many products require great expenditures to invent, but relatively
> little to copy. Why would anyone bother to spend the effort to invent
> something that a competitor could then knock off for free?
Why does an investment in development translate into a
guarantee of utility? And a monopoly at that. You're making a SOCIAL
argument, that the greater good is best served by a grant of monopoly
from the government (and I thought Libertarians didn't like those ...)
> (Of course, once new drug development ground to a halt, statists would step
> in and say that we need government funding for new research, since the
Actually, what would happen is pretty much what happens now in a
lot of cases -- there would indeed be government funding, but drug
companies would market the results, thus exploiting *public* research
for *private* profit.
> But the flaws in the system don't necessarily imply that intellectual
> property per se should be eliminated.
Is it a *right*, or simply advocated as a system to encourage a
particular form of development (for the overall good of society?!)? The
implications are very different. If you believe in software patents,
then the logical consequence is to regard Phil Zimmerman as a horrendous
criminal (as some people do - NOT for the export issue, over the RSA
patent). This is why I keep stressing that this case has to do with
software patents and intellectual property, not government invasion of
privacy. The export regulations are just the tool James Bidzos used to
"get" Zimmerman.
> You should read some libertarian journalism. It is full of stories about
> businesses (usually big) using government power to stifle competition.
Great - can you point me at some good articles?
================
Seth Finkelstein
sethf@mit.edu
