this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2024
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The software world is entirely dysfunctional because of IP. There's only so many ways to program a widget. If you didn't show up in time you get the snot sued out of you and you have to show in court you created that widget with zero input, contact, or experience with the big corporation. Good luck when that corporation is Microsoft or Apple. Open source code actually shows exactly how this would work. Linux has been forked how many times? And Ubuntu, one of the early distros is still going strong.
And if big business would never then explain patent trolls. If you want to talk about big business undercutting small ones out of business then we need to talk about monopoly laws, not patents.
Nobody said innovation was easy. But you brought up the software world. Specifically open source. Which shows that contrary to libertarian fantasies, innovation does indeed happen without guaranteed monetary compensation.
No. Education will not be irrelevant. And slavery will not win because these aren't patent and innovation issues. And companies will still innovate because people aren't going to stick around for old tech.
You haven't even begun to prove we'd lose half our jobs. This is just another ridiculous fear mongering segway.
And ah yes, why does open source software exist? Don't they know they're supposed to be making sure only they can work on that code?!? What's their motive if they aren't making money or hoarding it for their own ego like a dragon!
There is so much false information in your reply I don't even know where to start. Your idealized world is inherently illogical and cannot exist. You're against big corps and monopolies and seem to love the spirit of FOSS. But none of that logically implies any conclusions about IP and IP protection. You're confusing causation with correlation. I'll explain that below.
It only works because of IP. Software is IP: Software isn't manufactured, it's not produced, it has no operating cost, you cannot grab it, you can copy it indefinitely, etc. Take away IP protection, and the software developer can no longer pay their bills. The only one who can pay the bills is the one using the already developed software to build a service or materialized product. But that person does not need to pay the first one because he can just steal it.
If there were no protection on software, then nobody would develop it, this also counts for non-hobbyist FOSS projects. It's good that you brought up Linux as an example. Because Linux is also IP and is protected by laws and licenses. You cannot just freely copy a Linux distro. It needs to be under the same license and nothing more permissive than that. You can't just grap Linux, make it closed-source, modify it, and profit from it. Your Linux counterexample is actually a prime example why IP protection works. Linux is profitable because a lot of industries see value in it so they fund it. But the whole community thing only works because Linux has a license and there are laws that protect its existence and the work the developers do.
That's just wrong. First of all, there are laws on what can be patented and what is IP. Secondly, there are laws against monopolies. There are major law suits against Google and Apple right now and I see there being more in the future. I agree that there is a public and economic interest to prevent monopolies and anti-competitive behavior because they are a threat to our world economy. However, IP protection in general does not threaten anything like that. It's only remotely related. In a world without IP protection, monopolies would be even worse as these companies will always be the fastest to steal something and scale it to large economies.
FOSS does not mean free as in "free beer". This is a common misconception. FOSS software was never meant to be free-of-charge. FOSS means free as in "freedom to modify, use and distribute".
Innovation never happens at large scale without monetary compensation.
Sure, some smaller projects are developed by people in their free-time and provided as free-of-charge. But they are getting payed the rest of the day for, guess what, developing software with monetary intentions. How else are they going to pay their bills? The larger projects that people work at full time (Linux, Nextcloud come to mind) are funded either by donations, extra services or other means. They are always funded. And every one of the projects has a license that is defined by some IP protection law.
You're not against IP or monetizing IP. You're against big corps and monopolies squeezing them and misusing them for their own benefit. You need to make yourself clear what you're actually against. IP is a good thing and an incentive for innovation. Most importantly, it benefits the small innovators the most. What we need to do is write laws to stop monopolies from breaking the system.
I liked this discussion. However, I think both of you have different axioms. It's a pro-socialism vs pro-capitalism debate.
In capitalism, we need innovation to create new value. Or you can pollute water to sell water bottles which will have value now. It's up to citizens to decide what to restrict that was publicly available or what to innovate.
In socialism, the innovation is only happening where it needs to happen carefully planned and funded by the government.
I'm rather socialist, so I'd defend it:
Having a software with inability to modify is injustice, It's the same as polluting a water to sell it. Even if we need to pollute the water to sell it, it doesn't justify pollution.
Correlation and Causation are things in statistics. So that's right out the window.
Software is very much produced. And copying it is only half the battle. You have to actually run the service. Patch bugs and security holes. It isn't magic that comes from nothing. And nobody ever said FOSS was free, you can absolutely copy it, charge for it and keep the source open. That's 3 strawmen already.
ThErE ArE laWS oN whAt YoU cAn PatENt!
Not any that get enforced. Seriously the enforcement mechanism for an overly broad patent is a court finding that in the lawsuit where you have to defend your widget. The Patent Office does not care. Neither does the Copyright office.
tHeRe aRe LaWS aGAinSt MoNOpoLies
Nope. You'd have to be blind, deaf, and dumb, to genuinely believe there's any consequences for monopolistic behavior in the US. If some thing ever actually happens then feel free to come back but I wasn't born yesterday. My entire life has been watching the government approve larger and larger mergers and then issuing deferred prosecution agreements instead of actually holding a corporation accountable. Boeing killed hundreds of people with fraud and got docked a day's profit even after breaching their deferred prosecution agreement.
Have you been listening at all? You're worried about FAANG grabbing code and copying it before whoever came up with it can use it, but the actual problem we're facing is FAANG dreamed it's existence a decade ago and already patented the idea. In video games they patented dialogue boxes. The very idea that you might converse with an NPC in a video game is patented. And you want me to worry about start ups having their stuff stolen? Software is in the position where you can't make the plane because the idea of wings was patented already.
InNoVatION NevEr hApPeNs At lArGe ScAle WiThOuT mOneTaRy CoMPeNsAtiOn!
Explain DARPA. Explain FOSS. Explain 3D Printing. Explain art.
Don't tell me what I am for or against. I've already plainly stated that.