[Upd-discuss] Re: [upd-announce] Updates on the A2K Treaty Negotiation in Geneva

[Seth Johnson]

Jean-Baptiste Soufron wrote:
> 
> Le 22 juil. 05 à 05:15, davidt@public-domain.org a écrit :
> 
> >
> > Lastly, the UPD agrees that development must not be a 'pretext for
> > diluting international intellectual property'. We agree that it
> > should not
> > be a pretext, but instead the very basis from which the patent,
> > copyright
> > and trademark systems must seek their ultimate justification.
> 
> I don't agree with that sentence. The justification of patents,
> copyright and trademark systems is to grant a control on
> information : either as an economical incentive, either as a
> political tool. Most often it is both.


And I would take this to another place entirely, correcting the
notion that exclusive rights are about granting control on
information.

The purpose of exclusive rights policies is to provide
information to the public.  Everything else is means to that
end.  Once *information* is published, it can't be other than
free, because that's the nature of information as such.  We don't
give control on information in the case of copyright; we give
control on original expression.  We don't give control on
information for patents; we give control on manufacturing a
concrete product that, due to its novelty and newness, one can
reasonably expect might be someone's invention.  We wouldn't
think that for a purely abstract "invention."


Seth



> > When these
> > systems however come to impede socio-economic development -- when they
> > come to restrict access to essential educational tools, when they deny
> > individuals life-saving in the poorest parts of the world;
> > `intellectual
> > property' is in danger of itself becoming the pretext under which
> > we are
> > distracted from the complicated task of promoting development.
> 
> Defending the idea that Development could be the justification of
> Intellectual Control (IC ^_- blink for Richard) laws means not only
> entering the field of Law & Economics, but also entering that field
> on the wrong basis.
> 
> What will we answer when someone will demonstrate that there are
> better tools than PD to help developing third-world countries ?_______________________________________________
> Upd-discuss mailing list
> Upd-discuss@lists.essential.org
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