Really, would you care to address that directly (without referencing past posts that don't answer it directly either)? I would really like to see what you think would be the business climate IN THE LONG RUN without patents. ...
Let's address your questions (which are actually assertions because of their internal assumptions) one by one.
How would it work?
One only has to look at the fashion industry to understand how a patent-free economy might function. I agree that it would probably function differently. If we want to assume that the analogy to the fashion industry is cogent, companies like Apple would do R&D in secret (nothing new, there) and would profit from being the exclusive source for a new, innovative product until other companies scramble and manage to copy the resulting product. This "lead time" would either be quite valuable, or on the other hand, if not, that would be a clear sign that the "innovation" involved was not significant enough for society having a net gain from granting it patent protection. In addition, the companies which manage to produce the innovative products first would necessarily gain a more positive reputation (assuming that other factors in their overall customer experience, like reliability or customer support were at the same level or better than their competitors), and they would glean more sales because of this.
Why would anyone want to invest in R&D when their ideas get ripped off 10 minutes later?
An innovation which requires 10 minutes to "rip off" is hardly going to be something from which society would have benefited by protecting it with a patent, right? (LOL, I just see an image of a strawman coming alive, picking up a sword off the practice field, and fighting back at the soldiers practicing on it).
Wouldn't there be a big incentive to hide discoveries, rather than reveal them through patents?
As someone who works in R&D in high tech, let me tell you, when a problem develops which needs to be solved, the absolute last thing we would do is comb expired patents for the solution. In addition to your assumption that the information in expired patents is very important to fuel innovation, you also assume that reverse engineering new technology is somehow difficult. It isn't (no, Virginia, DRM which actually works doesn't exist).
> as you can assign a CC0 license or something similar
Unfortunately, there is currently no way to make a durable attachment of the license to the content, the minute someone forwards the content to someone else without the license, the person receiving it is just out of luck. Of course, one has the possibility for embedding RDF metadata in many file formats, but most people who create stuff have never heard of that. What the EU could do is recommend/regulate that content creation utilities, in their initial setup procedures, always ask what the default licensing terms are to be embedded into the created content (with CC0 or CC-BY being recommended for non-professional use).
Considering that people get shaken down for licensing fees (or be-FUD-ed) for patents which aren't even specified (e.g., Microsoft w.r.t. Linux/Android), I dare say that CAFC-a himself would be proud of the job this court is doing!
John R. Walker, a noted Australian artist (with whom I correspond), frequently blogs about how resale royalties do not help the majority of artists. See here, here, here, here, and here.
It's also bullshit to put the EU's implementation of resale royalties on a pedestal --- when Australia was researching the actual state of enforcement of this in the various European countries, it found that very few European countries enforce consistently (the UK being an exception). So it seems stupid to rush into "harmonizing" with a policy which, even on its home grounds, isn't exactly on a strong standing.
>The only one who has come out of this in any positive light is Kim Dotcom.
I'm just waiting for the US military to classify him as "an enemy of the United States". After all, we all know he's an enemy agent trying to undermine the solvency of the entertainment industry, without which the US economy would totally collapse...
(Oh, if only I could whole-heartedly add a tag...)
Fix the patent system so that patents with obvious prior art are not issued --- in fact, there should be a fine for applying for a patent when there exists blatant prior art. (The fine should be larger than the ordinary fees generated by an issued patent, so the USPTO would have an economic incentive to fine people.)
Thanks for giving us a prime example of what the inequalities in our education system generate!
The results of the education system of the US, and its political system, fit each other ideally. The first-past-the-post system thrives on a relatively uneducated, easily manipulated majority of voters, yet also needs to produce enough highly educated voters to prevent the economy from becoming too uncompetitive.
I understand that some individual defendants probably have individual defenses that would make joinder impractical.
Then you should also understand that actually bringing more than a handful of the defendants to trial seems even less likely. Which leads us to the conclusion that severing at the start is not actually damaging, in any practical form, to the plaintiff's actual ability to proceed against the defendants as a whole (in any way I can think of, except to send out blanket extortion/settlement offers).
> These lawsuits are an attempt to right a wrong
> where the deck is stacked against the victims.
I'm glad that you are so intimately acquainted with the rightsholders, and are sharing the personal information you have about their motivations.
Just like Thomas and Tennenbaum are exactly not the correct poster children for taking the infringement/punishment balance question to court, these pornographers and their multiply-sanctioned lawyers are not exactly ideal poster children for the other side...
As Average_Joe mentioned, why aren't you calling this judge out for being a senior citizen? Oh wait, you agree with his views this time, so he's right no matter what.
As the AC pointed out above, believing that this puts Mike in a bad light makes no sense whatsoever.
to it's same inevitable conclusion.
You seem to have a very interesting ideal of justice. I suppose in your world, it is a waste of time and money to actually give people the chance for a trial.
When a crime isn't prevented by (most) people's inherent sense of morality, the government often tries draconian punishment to see if it might do the trick, instead.
I don't remember a case where this has worked (in the long run).
Unfortunately, the choice of composition, angle, and lightning of the photograph is considered to be worthy of protection under copyright, even if the subject matter of the photograph does not itself qualify. The only exception is if the photograph is designed to be a "faithful copy" of the subject, which has to be a 2-dimensional work of art like another photograph, a drawing, or a painting.
You still see, however, the ubiquitous "Copyright 20XX" notice on postcards in museum giftshops, even for photographs which obviously don't qualify for protection. That always make me hopping mad.
I think it would be great if Baen decided to take advantage of the short-sightedness of some other publishers by giving libraries a much better deal (I don't see why they wouldn't sell their ebooks to libraries at the same reasonable prices they sell to the public, and let the libraries lend each ebook out an unlimited number of times, just not in parallel).
Their lack of DRM would also make it much easier for the libraries with respect to technical problems.
Why? For the reasons mentioned by the Ninth Circuit. Once Google has knowledge that a specific link points to infringing material, Google is thereafter facing liability for whatever infringement occurs via that link. The intent to cause that infringement is imputed.
This is just silly --- the reason Google honors DMCA takedowns is that it doesn't want to lose its "safe harbor" --- said "safe harbor" being a much, much better defense than the mere taking down of infringing material upon notification. You seem to have some understanding of the law, so you probably do realize that without that safe harbor, Google would anyway have been liable for the infringement even if it could show that it had no possibility of being aware of it previous to the notification --- as far as I know, ignorance and/or lack of intention is not a proper defense against the tort of copyright infringement (under US law).
> there are still many, many entries for Megaupload on Google
> ... Mike, really - can't you take 5 minutes and
> do a little reserch?
You should take 5 minutes (or maybe 5 hours, or whatever you require) to actually read and understand the content of the posts, before posing idiocy. In this case, Mike's whole point was that the fact that Google has entries for content which doesn't exist doesn't make it sensible for rightsholders to file DMCA takedowns concerning that content.
I suppose, if I were to put up a parody page parodying Megaupload, you would think it perfectly OK that it gets DMCA-ed out of existence, because it appears to provide links to files which are (erroneously) claimed to be infringing content? You do realize that that more or less means closing down any site which enables user-provided content, like this post --- example:
Given that the courts have no problem with Congress passing a law which makes it illegal (in some cases) to help someone to exercise his content-shifting rights (DMCA), I find it unlikely that they are going to suddenly make an earth-shaking precedent that making a copy for someone who, himself, could have legally made a copy, isn't actually making a copy (or it's fair use in some other way --- there are four standard criteria by which fair use is decided, and the service in question would seem to only satisfy one of the four criteria, and even that one, perhaps, only partially).
Stupid? * Yes! * (More like mega-stupid, actually). It's the same stupidity which causes Aereo to put up a tiny antenna for every subscriber, instead of just feeding "copies" from one central antenna.
And this is why the public is, more and more, understanding that copyright law is (in some ways) totally illogical and idiotic, and what will, in the end, undermine the public's respect for it.
> Actually, it is much less prevalent than it was.
How on earth would _you_ know?
I suspect that the vast majority of people haven't even heard of Tenenbaum, or this ongoing trial. And the majority of parents who might say that to their kids don't know how to prevent their kids from infringing on copyright. In fact, it's probable that the vast majority of people infringe on copyright every day.
Tell me, exactly, what songs do you sing at your children's birthday parties (assuming you have children)?
You obviously don't understand how P2P works. The average number of times any work is redistributed by people using P2P is exactly 1. Everyone, on the average, uploads information equivalent in size to exactly one whole copy of the work.
This doesn't mean that Joel couldn't have distributed massive amounts of copies (since there are always leechers who redistribute less than 1 copy), but it does mean that it is rather unlikely.
On the post: Is It Really A Good Idea To Open A 'Mini' Patent Office Directly Within Cornell's NYC Tech Campus?
Re:
On the post: European Parliament Committee Calls For Creation Without Copyright To Become EU Policy
Re: This is not as radical as it sounds.
Unfortunately, there is currently no way to make a durable attachment of the license to the content, the minute someone forwards the content to someone else without the license, the person receiving it is just out of luck. Of course, one has the possibility for embedding RDF metadata in many file formats, but most people who create stuff have never heard of that. What the EU could do is recommend/regulate that content creation utilities, in their initial setup procedures, always ask what the default licensing terms are to be embedded into the created content (with CC0 or CC-BY being recommended for non-professional use).
On the post: The Rogue Court That Made Patents So Destructive
CAFC-aesque, indeed
On the post: US Copyright Office Seeking Comments On Resale Royalties For Visual Artists
Re: Re:
It's also bullshit to put the EU's implementation of resale royalties on a pedestal --- when Australia was researching the actual state of enforcement of this in the various European countries, it found that very few European countries enforce consistently (the UK being an exception). So it seems stupid to rush into "harmonizing" with a policy which, even on its home grounds, isn't exactly on a strong standing.
On the post: Megaupload Farce Stirring Up Backlash Against Copyright Overreach
Re:
I'm just waiting for the US military to classify him as "an enemy of the United States". After all, we all know he's an enemy agent trying to undermine the solvency of the entertainment industry, without which the US economy would totally collapse...
(Oh, if only I could whole-heartedly add a tag...)
On the post: Hospital Tech Declines To Patent His Invention, As Saving Lives Is 'More Important Than Money'
Even Better Idea
On the post: Garbage In, Garbage Out On Studies Concerning Which Countries 'Lead' In Education
Re:
The results of the education system of the US, and its political system, fit each other ideally. The first-past-the-post system thrives on a relatively uneducated, easily manipulated majority of voters, yet also needs to produce enough highly educated voters to prevent the economy from becoming too uncompetitive.
On the post: Another Judge Blasts Copyright Trolls
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Another Judge Blasts Copyright Trolls
Re: Re: Re: Re:
> where the deck is stacked against the victims.
I'm glad that you are so intimately acquainted with the rightsholders, and are sharing the personal information you have about their motivations.
Just like Thomas and Tennenbaum are exactly not the correct poster children for taking the infringement/punishment balance question to court, these pornographers and their multiply-sanctioned lawyers are not exactly ideal poster children for the other side...
On the post: Another Judge Blasts Copyright Trolls
Re:
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re: Absolutely brilliant
On the post: US Government Ups Felony Count In JSTOR/Aaron Swartz Case From Four To Thirteen
Re: Punishment fits the crime?
I don't remember a case where this has worked (in the long run).
On the post: University Requires Students To Pay $180 For 'Art History' Text That Has No Photos Due To Copyright Problems
Re:
You still see, however, the ubiquitous "Copyright 20XX" notice on postcards in museum giftshops, even for photographs which obviously don't qualify for protection. That always make me hopping mad.
On the post: Hachette Hits Libraries With 220% Price Increase On Its Ebooks
Re:
Their lack of DRM would also make it much easier for the libraries with respect to technical problems.
On the post: Twitter Hands Over Info After Judge Makes It Almost Impossible For It Not To
EFF with a judicial choice of words?
On the post: Dutch Court Says Linking Can Be A Form of Copyright Infringement
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Copyright Holders Still Sending DMCA Takedowns On Content That's Been Gone For Months
Re:
> ... Mike, really - can't you take 5 minutes and
> do a little reserch?
You should take 5 minutes (or maybe 5 hours, or whatever you require) to actually read and understand the content of the posts, before posing idiocy. In this case, Mike's whole point was that the fact that Google has entries for content which doesn't exist doesn't make it sensible for rightsholders to file DMCA takedowns concerning that content.
I suppose, if I were to put up a parody page parodying Megaupload, you would think it perfectly OK that it gets DMCA-ed out of existence, because it appears to provide links to files which are (erroneously) claimed to be infringing content? You do realize that that more or less means closing down any site which enables user-provided content, like this post --- example:
*** Download the latest blockbuster movie here at URL http://this.link.goesnowhere.com/Harry_Potter_vs._Bambi ***
Ooops, I guess there goes this whole discussion, down the DMCA-hole?
On the post: Authors Guild Continues To Battle The Present; Attacks Another Legal Service As 'Infringing'
Unfortunate that the AC is probably correct
Stupid? * Yes! * (More like mega-stupid, actually). It's the same stupidity which causes Aereo to put up a tiny antenna for every subscriber, instead of just feeding "copies" from one central antenna.
And this is why the public is, more and more, understanding that copyright law is (in some ways) totally illogical and idiotic, and what will, in the end, undermine the public's respect for it.
On the post: District Court: $675,000 For Non-commercially Sharing 30 Songs Is Perfectly Reasonable
Re: Re:
How on earth would _you_ know?
I suspect that the vast majority of people haven't even heard of Tenenbaum, or this ongoing trial. And the majority of parents who might say that to their kids don't know how to prevent their kids from infringing on copyright. In fact, it's probable that the vast majority of people infringe on copyright every day.
Tell me, exactly, what songs do you sing at your children's birthday parties (assuming you have children)?
On the post: District Court: $675,000 For Non-commercially Sharing 30 Songs Is Perfectly Reasonable
Unlikely to be true
You obviously don't understand how P2P works. The average number of times any work is redistributed by people using P2P is exactly 1. Everyone, on the average, uploads information equivalent in size to exactly one whole copy of the work.
This doesn't mean that Joel couldn't have distributed massive amounts of copies (since there are always leechers who redistribute less than 1 copy), but it does mean that it is rather unlikely.
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