Even if they were all in the public domain, he's basically "set", being a university professor with tenure.
It would be a less pleasant world where only those with other secure income from other sources could produce information goods.
It would be a less pleasant world where only those with other secure income from other sources could produce information goods.
And you were going to say that's a bad thing because...?
Sure university is a somewhat special case; we don't expect everybody to become a professor. But, in similar vein, artists earn money by performing. Open source developers earn money by utilizing their knowledge and skill in paid-for projects. Etc., etc.
> artists earn money by performing
What you're saying, in economic terms, is that musicians have rivalrous, excludable goods they can produce: the concert experience.
That's not bad, although it would have the IMO negative effect of leaving the Brian Wilson (much more oriented towards studio work than touring) types between a rock and a hard place.
Authors don't really have that: they could sign books, but that would reduce their income drastically, as most copies would be freely had.
> Open source developers earn money by utilizing their knowledge and skill in paid-for projects.
As for the open source developers, but WHERE DOES THE MONEY COME FROM in those paid-for projects? Scarcity is where it comes from, and often, they're getting paid to work on open source by someone who deals in the artificial scarcity of intellectual property.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Google, IBM and the likes earn by selling services and goods rather than artificially limiting intellectual property.
((cue Android download link and AdWords control panel link))
> Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
No. It always comes from scarcity of some kind.
In the case of consulting, the scarcity might be expertise in putting together some kind of enterprisey system, but there is always going to be scarcity, otherwise no money will be exchanged.
And you can rest assured that IBM has made plenty of money from IP itself over the years - they're no strangers to software or any other kind of patents, nor selling software like DB2. Also: do you think that IBM's services division would make as much money if they posted all their code to the internet? I bet many of their clients believe (right or wrong) that the custom solutions they're getting are a competitive advantage and do not want to freely share them with the competition who is not shelling out big bucks to IBM.
With regards to Google's IP, you can be very sure that they would invoke all kinds of IP laws were someone to walk out of their HQ and post important bits and pieces of their search engine tech to the internet. These days, they're in a pretty good position to survive in any case, but think about trying to start a company and have no way of doing anything if people walked out and posted your "crown jewels" to the internet.
Meaning, if you want to gain any wealth, then work on something scarce, and make sure it stays scarce. Let everyone do that, and we get a world of scarcity.
Hmm…
I thought that a world of abundance was better?
You don't just get to wave your hands and make things "abundant", someone has to do the work, and in order to do the work they have to make a living at it, at the very least.
A monopoly large enough is able to self-sustain, by adjusting the environment to its needs. And let's say that openly: including adjusting the law.
Of course, at some point their growth is stopped by growing pains of internal communication & management. What does the development of management theory and practice spell for the future, we shall see.
While competition does have its place for helping humanity, it should also be recognized as not being useful in the production of other types of goods.
I think - A) Competition is good for some types of goods, not all. (I don't remember/know the correct economic criteria to define this.)
B) IP laws are good/great for some research, and bad/terrible for others.
C) I do not see the current system incentivizing humanity's good over personal/shareholder profit.
D) The current system has 'Human Good' occur as a side effect of rewarding people to do their best. It is vastly better than any system which has existed before. it will be better if we can fix C).
I agree with your points, and think that D and C are incremental improvements to the existing system to try and make with time, rather than a reason to junk the entire thing.
There is good in the system, it needs more people to help managed and identify fraudulent/cheating behavior which is aimed at gaming the system.
I also think we need a smaller net so that fewer things can be patented. Again, this is for the freedom to exchange information and ideas, which leads to the betterment of humanity as a whole.
Everything we do has been built on the ideas and labor of others before us. It makes little sense to me to imagine we will be better off by not letting future generations do the same.
Then you don't have the stick-filesharers-in-jail problem.
On the other hand when it comes to artists and sharing of other similar IP, the current system can do with shorter copyright terms. At least thats my non-nuanced starting point on these discussions.
(!!Science!!)
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www.giftflow.org (still in alpha)
Cory Doctorow seems to manage just fine. OK, that's not easy. But I'm not sure it's harder than earning money from a standard publisher, and it looks at least possible.
http://craphound.com/ftw/Cory_Doctorow_-_For_the_Win.htm
Also, you have to look at these things at the margin: were all authors to do this, how many would no longer be able to support themselves with their writing, and thus be forced to stop or curtail their activities? He's a relatively well known writer: maybe it's ok for him to make, say, 100K rather than 200K a year. Some guy making 50K a year may have to give it up if his income is cut in half.
Furthermore, consider that just now the Kindle and similar systems are really starting to take off. In 2005 or so, you either bought the paper book and had yourself a nice read, or stared at an LCD for hours, which is not my idea of pleasant.
> He is `set' because he continuously fulfills the expectation of the employer: he publishes (and teaches etc.). And expectations of the wide public: he provides information to us.
I don't think you understand what "tenure" means. Think of it like having your stock options fully vested and exercised, except that the company pays dividends every year, and you had so many options that you can live on the dividends.