libertarians (was: Re: Owning a piece of my mind)

[Eric Eldred <eldred@mediaone.net>]

another section of my long response.

Ori Pomerantz wrote:
> 

> > The libertarians on the net seem to feel that the free market will
> > solve these problems automatically.

>         A free market WILL solve them, for example because people won't
> compose their poems using the encumbering "aids" distributed by companies
> which want to own the content. To quote Linus Thorvalds: "Whoever writes
> the code gets to set the license, and nobody else gets to complain". It's
> your decision whether or not to use a particular tool, which should depend
> both on how much value it adds to your work AND the cost of using it.
>         The problem is when the politicians make the market unfree by
> outlawing, for example, DAT tapes or mpeg3 devices.

Oh yes, the free market will solve them. But the
libertarians never read Adam Smith properly.  

For example, would you say the Republic of South
Africa is free to make its own decisions about
how to keep the AIDS victims there from dying?
They say (and I have no reason to doubt it) that
they cannot afford the terribly expensive drugs
that are availabe in the rich countries, and that
the drug companies will not sell the drugs at
a "reasonable" price (a price the drug companies
say does not properly reimburse them for the
costs of developing and distributing the drugs).

So there are some who say that the government there
ought to produce the drugs itself, even if that
means violating the patents or other intellectual
property rights of the drug companies in the rich
countries.  And there are others who say that
instead of violating intellectual property rights,
the citizens of Africa should choose to die.

It's not the politicians who are in
the center here, it is the corporations.  They
are the ones who wish to remove all fair use
rights from users of digital content such as
video tapes or MP3.  They therefore make the issue
into one of "free trade" or "property rights" that
make it seem as if they are doing us a favor by
taking away our money and our lives.

Now, as far as whether or not code rules here or
not, or whether or not we are free to choose an
alternative, my answer has to be, sometimes yes
and sometimes no.  But is wrong to think that a
free market will remain free unless distorted by
government intervention, and that somehow consumers
always have the chance to restore freedom to a 
market.

>It's
> your decision whether or not to use a particular tool, 
>which should depend
> both on how much value it adds to your work AND the cost 
>of using it.

Yes, you can decide whether or not to mail me a letter.
You can choose to put a stamp on it or not.  But if
you don't put a stamp on it, it will not be delivered.
Is that a distortion of the free market?  You can
choose to pay me a million dollars for me to give you
a drug that will save your life, or you can choose to
die.  Is that a distortion of the free market?

When Microsoft has control over and a monopoly position
over every banking transaction that you make online,
is that a distortion of the free market?  But that
is exactly what might happen if intellectual property
rights advocates win in establishing their "strong"
position over the rest of us.  You can then choose
whether or not you wish to deal with banks--most
people will, and you can choose to live in a free
market area such as Russia or Viet Nam instead.
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