kottke.org: When you die, become an intellectual property donor.:
Why let all of your ideas die with you? Current Copyright law prevents anyone from building upon your creativity for 70 years after your death. Live on in collaboration with others. Make an intellectual property donation. By donating your IP into the public domain you will “promote the progress of science and useful arts” (U.S. Constitution). Ensure that your creativity will live on after you are gone, make a donation today.
There are many who disagree, but the study appears to raise interesting issues regarding the benefit to society of copyright protections. As Mike Masnick writes, copyright is about balancing benefits (incentives to create with the benefits of distribution).
Intellectual property, despite the name, doesn't quite work like regular property. A look at intellectual property markets highlight problems with a pure free-market approach that aren't necessarily visible with other markets.
One approach to dealing with privacy would be to extend property rights to cover information or personal data, rather as copyright, patents, trademarks, and other forms of intellectual property extended physical rules into the realm of the intangible. While there are undoubtedly benefits to this, there are limitations as well
Study on file sharing and copyright: weaker protections benefit society
I'm currently a graduate student of the history of law and technology at the University of California, San Diego. I also provide law and technology consulting services.
Additionally, I'm a non-practicing lawyer and former developer/sysadmin at a biotech non-profit. For more about me and my work, see krisnelson.org or my Google Profile. Post title: When you die, become an intellectual property donor.
Authored by: Kristopher Nelson
Date posted: Feb 27, 2008
Categorized as: constitution • copyright • law
Tagged with: constitution • copyright • intellectual property • law • science
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