126 sats \ 3 replies \ @didiplaywell 13 Jul \ on: The Absurdity of Intellectual Property Laws alter_native
"Intellectual Property" is a flawed concept. It doesn't even benefit the creator as much as it appears, that's the reason open-source companies like Prusa exists and thrive. The secret is not to hold property on a concept, but to master it. People pays for that, and the ones who copy you makes you the standard, that's a win, not a crime. That's not to say that you can not register a concept to be credited as the author, but to pretend to prohibit other people to think the same things you are thinking is absolutely insane. "If I draw this, you can not draw it". Ridiculous, insane, flawed. I can't stand it.
I think it's part of the "everything I don't like should be illegal" mindset.
It doesn't feel good to see someone else getting credit for something you did first. Social norms can take care of that, though, by shaming people who pretend to have created something when they should have given attribution.
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Even more: in practice, in the engineering world, everyone shares what they know because they can only benefit from doing so. So even if you can keep secrecy at first (which might actually make sense at the very beginning), chances are at some point you will start benefiting much more from openly sharing what you have. I'm not saying that hypothetically, that's what actually happens in the engineering community at large. I benefit myself from it lavishly and give back as much as I can in return. It's like zapping! :)
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Credit is manageable. Using the same line of thought to prohibit someone to even repeat your words is insane. And it's fully hypocritical, because no patent pays to the bibliography it's based on. You do can keep secrecy, that's for sure.
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