Aren’t there any other natural rights libertarians here?

Anyway, if a software engineer is truly able to command a price of $2million on their software in a free market then that is the market price, and fine. If they are able to retain their market niche and can continue selling binary enhancements at $2k because no-one wants the source code (their IP without monopoly) at $2m then that’s fine too.

Are there really no competitors in the future?

Either the source code is indeed worth $2m, or it’s overpriced and a competitor can knock it out for $1m or less.

The free market rapidly brings the price of software (source code) to accord with the labour cost.

Binaries become free demonstrations that the software development (source code) has been produced to spec.

They do not want to abolish ip, but rather want it to be “better” in the future.

That (implying the property rights in intellectual works) is not libertarian.

“Russ, in a world without copyright you can’t sell copies, so no-one is going to be interested in keeping the source code secret, especially given it is the source code they have to start selling.”

I’ve already explained how a developer could make money by giving away binaries, and then selling his services making customized modifications. And that’s just one of many possibilities. They wouldn’t have to sell source code.

“Even today, a software engineer employed by Microsoft who told them they should be happy paying him for his binaries as they were just as effective as his source code (which he’d prefer to keep to himself) would be fired on the spot.”

This is true, but completely irrelevant.

“The same thing applies post-copyright when people start selling software instead of copies. No purchaser is going to pay good money for a binary. They’ll demand the source or no deal.”

If a company says “$X for a binary, $100X for the source”, then there will be customers who would live without the source, believe me. I used to work for a company that made machine tools. The customer demanded the source code, which the machine tool company keeps proprietary. The president of the machine tool company said, “OK, the source is yours for $2 million, plus you sign a non-disclosure agreement.” (That was more than the cost of the automotive assembly machine that went with the software.) The customer stopped demanding the source code.

Even today, a software engineer employed by Microsoft who told them they should be happy paying him for his binaries as they were just as effective as his source code (which he’d prefer to keep to himself) would be fired on the spot.

The same thing applies post-copyright when people start selling software instead of copies. No purchaser is going to pay good money for a binary. They’ll demand the source or no deal.

“I prefer to see the GPL as a copyright-neutralizing license: it uses copyright to create the conditions that would be there if copyright didn’t exist.”

No, it doesn’t. A world without copyright would *allow* free “speech” (in the form of sharing binaries). The GPL not only allows this form of speech, but *requires* that you share source code, which in a world without copyright you may not wish to do.

This is somewhat unrelated to the above, but I wonder: has the GPL ever been tested in a court of law in the USA? If so, what was the result?

“Without copyright, though, it is hard to imagine any serious developers to conspire to keep their source code secret.”

It’s not hard to imagine at all. Let’s say that some company has a binary copy of an un-copyrighted but non-open-source application. They would find it so much more useful, if only it had a few extra features. They contact you, the developer, and you tell them that you would be happy to add those features for a small fee. As long as the fee is not so large that it would be more cost-effective for them to reverse engineer the binary, it could be reasonable for them to go along with your deal.

I just think these are two very different movements. And of course, I like Kinsella’s better!

Without copyright, though, it is hard to imagine any serious developers to conspire to keep their source code secret. That is a development model that, without copyright, simply does not work.

I prefer to see the GPL as a copyright-neutralizing license: it uses copyright to create the conditions that would be there if copyright didn’t exist.

Thinking that you have the right to control the “speech” of others doesn’t seem particularly libertarian to me.

(feel free to delete this comment along with the spurious duplicate)

Thus the monopolies of copyright and patent are unconstitutional privileges and should be abolished.

Just to be clear about it.

Thus the monopolies of copyright and patent are unconstitutional privileges and should be abolished.

Just to be clear about it.

It gives congress power to SECURE the exclusive right that writers and inventors are RECOGNISED to have by nature. Writers and inventors are naturally able to prevent others accessing those works exclusive to them, and consequently have a natural exclusive right to those works that should be secured by a suitably empowered government.

There was a suggestion that monopolies in literary and technological works should be added to the bill of rights, but this thankfully didn’t go ahead. Even so, copyright and patent were legislated anyway. No-one at the time had sufficient clout to point out that not only were such monopolies not sanctioned by the Constitution nor any amendment, but that the Constitution (or bill of rights) CANNOT GRANT PRIVILEGES! (or legal rights as IP lawyers predictably prefer them termed today)

See Rights of Man:

Human rights originate in Nature, thus, rights cannot be granted via political charter, because that implies that rights are legally revocable, hence, would be privileges:

It is a perversion of terms to say that a charter gives rights. It operates by a contrary effect — that of taking rights away. Rights are inherently in all the inhabitants; but charters, by annulling those rights, in the majority, leave the right, by exclusion, in the hands of a few . . . They . . . consequently are instruments of injustice.

The fact, therefore, must be that the individuals, themselves, each, in his own personal and sovereign right, entered into a compact with each other to produce a government: and this is the only mode in which governments have a right to arise, and the only principle on which they have a right to exist.

And for the record, I am a libertarian proponent of intellectual property, but that’s natural IP, without unnatural monopoly.

Could be, but aside from IP-based arguments it’s hard to think of any valid reason for a libertarian to attack free software advocates. Anyway, I see no reason to think that it’s “thinness” that leads them astray.

Which was precisely my point: the free software movement is not hostile to libertarian values, and so it’s foolish for libertarians to go out of their way to attack it. I think this is a valid point irrespective of one’s views on “IP.”

Also, I think a lot of ground can be gained by pointing out that the only reason that telecoms have the opportunity to have a monopoly and do “bad” things is because the government, especially local governments, have given the telecoms their position through franchising, regulation, miscellaneous laws, and the federal control of the electromagnetic spectrum. So, if government caused the problem, instead of giving government more power, auspiciously to fix its own shortcomings, why not deregulated and free the market up? Why is more government going to fix problems that are caused by government control and direction?

Lastly, the fear that the telecoms will do various “bad” things for the Internet is possibly a bigger farce than the run up to the Iraq war. No telecom has seriously proposed doing something that would break the supposed principals of net neutrality. Second, if they did, they would be put out of business from the backlash. Comcast already found this out the hard way when they tried to shape bit-torrent traffic, which actually might have been justified. Lastly, the telecoms could not do most of what people are afraid they might, from a purely technical point of view. Between proxy servers, encryption, and other technologies, no one can control the Internet, except that is governments, who can theoretical shutdown all networks with police actions and fiat. Look at China and Iran, those governments try to cut of their citizens off and can not, except for shutting down practically all traffic leaving and entering the country. But, ask the average, technically savvy Chinese or Iranian citizen, and they will tell you they can do whatever they want on the Internet, no matter what the government tries.

But anyway,

TRacy

The statement “Everyone should have access to affordable Healthcare” is an example of common ends. These ends, as stated, are reasonable and difficult to deny as worthy goals. The trouble arises with the means that are employed to achieve the goal.

Same is true of “Net Neutrality”. The goal, is to have a free and open internet. It’s the means, say via state regulations, mandates, etc. that create the opposite resluts from the stated goals. Over and over throughout history, lofty goals have been completely missed by regulatory force.

Libertarians place no faith in government. Instead, we place our faith in the common person, and the decisions they make for themselves. Free markets only work if people trust themselves and each other, rather than distrusting everyone except the regulators.

Most people cannot make the connection between trust in themselves, trust in the public-at-large, and distrust of regulatory bodies as the cornerstones of freedom and free society.

Communism, Fascism, Socialism all place the distrust in the individual and the people-at-large, and the concentrated trust of “society” in a handful of “regulators”.

This is an error in judgement at the very least. All of us as individuals are capable of regulating ourselves. Together, under the same circumstances, we tend to the same solutions. But put all the decision making capacity of an entire society into the brains of a few anointed ones is folly. The only exception to this is in time of war or disaster, or the voluntary raising of a leader in commerce. It is only important for the body to have a head when there is need for quick decisions. This is why we have an executive branch of government. This is why we have hiearchy in business.

But we don’t need a “head” for every social problem!