All Posts Tagged With: "patents"
Contra-IP
My article “Patent Nonsense,” which makes the libertarian case against “intellectual property,” was published and posted by The American Conservative magazine. Read it here.
3Feb2012 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedPatently Improper
Whether you agree with the original purpose of patents in America or believe (as I do) that all patents are improper, the America Invents Act is repellent.
27Sep2011 | Wendy McElroy | 28 comments | ContinuedSlave Labor and Intellectual Property
If one favors property rights in tangible things, why would one not favor them in intangibles?
3Jun2011 | Sheldon Richman | 119 comments | ContinuedHow Intellectual Property Hampers the Free Market
Advocates of free-market capitalism commonly believe in the legitimacy of intellectual property (IP) because IP rights are thought to be important to a system of private property. But are they? There are good reasons to think that IP is not actually property—that it is actually antithetical to a private-property, free-market order. By intellectual property, I [...]
25May2011 | N. Stephan Kinsella | 56 comments | ContinuedThis Is Free Trade?
The so-called Republic of Korea-United States Free Trade Agreement has lived down to expectations. Note this excerpt from a report in The Hill: Specifically, the agreement extends intellectual property protections by ensuring copyright holders have the exclusive right to publish their works online. It also bans the hacking of technology used to protect copyrighted work [...]
7Dec2010 | Sheldon Richman | 1 comment | ContinuedCapital Letters
Can There Be Free Trade in a Mixed Economy? To the Editor: Although I don’t see any flaws in your arguments about the theory of free trade in your column for the April 2004 issue of The Freeman, you should at least acknowledge the distortions in most any nation’s economy because of government intervention and [...]
5Jul2010 | FEE Admin | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Patent System: End It, Don't Mend It
Freeman authors David Levine and Michele Boldrin call for an end to patents in this Christian Science Monitor article. A taste: [I]ntellectual property does not increase innovation and creation. Extending IP rights may modestly boost the incentive for innovation, but this positive effect is wiped away by the negative effect of creating monopolies. There is [...]
9Dec2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedIP Debate Breaks Out at FEE
At a recent FEE seminar, a debate over intellectual “property” broke out spontaneously among Ivan Pongracic (second from right), Paul Cwik (second from left), and me (left, where I belong). Who won?
15Jun2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedIntellectual “Property” Versus Real Property
Intellectual “property” (IP) is a sleeper issue. It seems uncontroversial: Someone invents or writes something and therefore owns it. What could be plainer? But IP contains the power to destroy liberty. IP isn’t merely about rock bands preventing kids from sharing MP3s over the Internet. (See “Weird Al” Yankovic’s musical commentary, “Don’t Download This Song,” [...]
12Jun2009 | Sheldon Richman | 9 comments | ContinuedTGIF: Intellectual "Property" Versus Real Property
Intellectual “property” (IP) is a sleeper issue. It seems uncontroversial: Someone invents or writes something and therefore owns it. What could be plainer? But IP contains the power to destroy liberty. The rest of TGIF is here.
12Jun2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedRegarding Intellectual "Property"
I highly recommend Kevin Carson‘s “‘Intellectual Property’: A Libertarian Critique” (pdf), published by the Center for a Stateless Society. It is first-rate. So-called intellectual property is not just about rock bands “protecting” recordings. It’s about big dinosaur corporations attempting to subordinate people through the control of ideas. This big issue will only get bigger in [...]
7Jun2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedDo Patents Encourage or Hinder Innovation? The Case of the Steam Engine
Today one of the most controversial issues in economic policy is that of patent law. Is a patent just an extension of property rights to the realm of ideas? Or is it an unwarranted interference by the government into the rights of individuals?
1Dec2008 | Michele Boldrin, David K. Levine, and Alessandro Nuvolari | 37 comments | ContinuedHierarchy or the Market
In an article in last June’s Freeman, I applied some ideas from the socialist-calculation debate to the private corporation and examined the extent to which it is an island of calculational chaos in the market economy. I’d like to expand that line of analysis now and apply some common free-market insights on knowledge and incentives [...]
1Apr2008 | Kevin A. Carson | 2 comments | ContinuedPatently Unnecessary?
The idea that government should issue patents for inventions is odd on its face. How can someone claim an exclusive right in a “practical application” of nature’s principles? Of course, an inventor can have a right to an object. But a right to bar others from using the application embodied in that object? That’s hard [...]
1Apr2006 | Sheldon Richman | 1 comment | ContinuedMises on Copyrights
The widespread reproduction and “sharing” of copyrighted music on the Internet led a friend to ask me what Ludwig von Mises would have thought about the situation. The more I pondered the question, the more I concluded that Mises would have considered this just another case where copyright law must play catch-up with new technology. [...]
1Jun2004 | Bettina Bien Greaves | 2 comments | ContinuedPatents and Monopoly Privilege
Christopher Mayer is a commercial loan officer and freelance writer. “Discovery can give no right of ownership, for whatever is discovered must have been already here to be discovered. If a man makes a wheelbarrow, or a book, or a picture, he has a moral right to that particular wheelbarrow, or book, or picture, but [...]
1Oct2000 | Christopher Mayer | 1 comment | ContinuedThe Amazing Creative Power of One
Mr. Mason, Inc. Magazine Entrepreneur of the Year, has been inducted into the Entrepreneur Hall of Fame (University of North Carolina). Based in Weston, Connecticut, he has lectured at more than 20 colleges and universities across the United States and Canada. He has been the University of Connecticut’s Director of Entrepreneurship Development, and he is [...]
1Jul1997 | Stanley I. Mason Jr. | 0 comments | Continued-
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