Alexander

Property binds "all third parties", i.e. everyone in the world. This is abosulutely correct, and applies to physical property just as IP. My claim of ownership of my house and my land gives me the right to exclude everyone uninvited, up to and including killing them if necessary. Property is a moral claim to exclude. Copyright law could absolutely arise through Common Law in a libertarian world, all that is needed is to understand and accept the Doctrine of Intellectual Space, Matter and Property. Intellectual Property then arises in precisely the same fashion and for precisely the same reasons as Physical Property, Kinsella's assertions notwithstanding.

I don't think so. What about non-disclosure agreements (NDA)? What if I'm having an affair and the girl and I sign a contract not to tell my wife? What if you and I do business, and as a provision for said business you and I agree never to do business with let's say Wal Mart? Not all contracts are about items being sold or licensed. I offered many examples for contracts that are about keeping a trade secret or not doing X (which can be done without any property being involved). Hold on. If you sell me a DVD, it's mine. If you grant me license (in a free society) to using the content of a DVD but in order to obtain the license I am prohibited from, say, making a copy, that would be part of the underlying contract. The contract between you and me, that is, not with a third party. Alexander and Libertus agree to the following: Alexander hands Libertus a copy of his latest film and in exchange Libertus pays Alexander the sum X and agrees to not share the contents of the film with anyone or make copies, or do X, do Y. Libertus agrees that if he gets caught violating the terms of this contract he will pay Alexander the sum of X*10 in gold. That would be a contract between parties who give their consent to honor your 'intellectual property' or however you want to call it. The difference between arrangements like these and the concept that we call intellectual property today is that a contract can only be binding to its signees, and whether you want to do business exclusively among people who agree with you on honoring a concept called 'intellectual property' and who want to bind themselbes to a contract saying so, is your decision alone. But it's not synonymous with any sort of IP law we know today. I don't object to you calling it ip, but I see where it gets confusing. I repeat, only property can be the subject of contract. Period. Non-disclosure and non-competition contracts are agreements about what will not be said, and what will not be done. In both cases the subject matter is the human body, which is owned by the contracting party. Such contract is valid, but if I tried to make a contract prohibiting some other person from saying something, it would be invalid because I do not own the other person's body. If you will allow me to contract regarding that which is not my property, then I'd like to sell you the Brooklyn Bridge. How can I contract with you to not copy the pattern of ideas of my DVD, if I do not own the pattern of ideas? In your anti-IP world, suppose I sell you a DVD and you agree not to copy the DVD. You make a copy of the movie on a Flash Drive. Have you violated our agreement? The flash drive is in no physical sense a duplicate of the DVD. The only thing duplicated is an abstract understanding of the intellectual content.

Only property can be the subject matter of a contract. If I don't own it, I can't sell or license it to you. If I sell or license you a DVD, but I do not enjoy a property right in the pattern of ideas embodied therein, by what contractual language could I prohibit you from duplicating the pattern while utilizing your own physical property?

Businesses that are unprofitable cease to exist. Live entertainment could still exist absent IP, but it is very difficult for me to imagine the existence of recorded entertainment without IP. I'm open to input on this. As Stef routinely points out, the argument from morality is a more persuasive approach than the argument from effect. The core argument for a free society is and must always be: The initiation of force is wrong. But utilitarian considerations cannot be ingored completely. It is human nature to be concerned about how the future affects oneself. I think it's fair to say that a libertarian argument for a free society in which IP exists is more persuasive than a libertarian argument in which IP does not exist, all other things begin equal. As I've said, with the implementation of my theory, IP now does not require any deviation from our core principles.

I agree, nobody has any right to profit. Businesses that fail on the free market should fail, "free market" meaning a strict observance of property rights. So again, it comes down to whether or not a pattern of ideas can rightly be property. I'm providing, or at least attempting to provide, a previously unavailable theory of IP that does not require any deviation from self-ownership and NAP. It simply requires an acceptance of a new conceptual framework, like learning algebra after you have mastered arithmetic. In terms of persuading others to accept the philosopical correctness of NAP, with the Doctrine of Intellectual Space, Matter and Property there will now be a great advantage in NOT having to convince people that a correct ethical system means "no more movies". Might be a bit of an easier sell, don't you think?

Financed is easy, documentaries find money all the time. How do you suppose Zeitgiest was funded? What about Thrive? Hell, Alex Jones can get backers for his crazy movies. Financially exploited is another thing altogether. If you mean "used to produce revenue", then the answer is simple: by public exhibition. I don't know if you've noticed, but movies at the theater make tens of millions of dollars in profit. Even with my rampant piracy, those studios still manage to earn a living. Those who hold IP are better off. I don't think anyone argues that holding a patent isn't financially advantageous. I believe those documentaries were funded through charitiable donations, I don't think they were profitable. Let's assume that for discussion. Unprofiability doesn't make the financing "easy", as a business venture it makes it "impossible". Yes, some people are willing to spend money on artisitic or educational projects that do not return an investment, but this is a hobby or recreation, not a way to earn a living. People have to earn a profit somehow before they have money to spend on hobbies. A lack of IP appears then to threaten the viability of artistic and educational projects as a business model. "Public exhibition" means showing a movie in a movie theater. Let's be clear on terms. A movie theater is private property, in a free society there is no "public" property. Would not the movie company require patrons of the theater to agree not to bring recording devices into the theater? Does a no-recording agreement represent an infringement of the physical property rights of the movie patron? imagine a world of no IP-enforcemnt, where copying a DVD is perfectly legal. Suppose further that the movie maker attemps to "copy protect" the DVD with some sort of technological solution. To explore this, let's consider the two extreme cases. In one scenario the copy-protect works perfectly and, even though copying is legal, would-be copiers are simply unable to do so. In the other scenario, the copy-protect is a failure, and users are easily able to copy the movie. Is it fair to say that successful copy-protection would allow for profitability of movies released on DVD, and failed copy-protection would mean DVD movies could not possibly be profitable? Is the success or failure of a copy-protect solution something that can be rationally assessed? If IP does not exist, on what basis can the success or failure of copy-protect possibly be assessed? In other words, what does copy-protect seek to protect?

Stephan Kinsella has argued that IP stifles innovation and dis-coordinates the economy. In other words, enforcement of IP has the opposite effect from enforcement of physical property rights, says Kinsella. In the current statist model, IP holders may abandon their copyrights and / or patents, as some have. The vast majority, however, have not. Is it fair to say that most intellectual creatives believe THEY are better off with an enforcement of IP? How might a motion picture be financed and financially explotied in a world without copyright?

II think to say intellectual property does not exist is trivially true because it is observably true. you cannot point to me anything that is called intellectual property in the real world. Intellectual property is then entirely a conceptual thing. Thus your analysis needs to start identifyling what property IS at a very sundamental level. If property is a MORAL CLAIM (as I understand it to be), then it is a concept rather than a physical object, and it needs to be demonstrated as sound, which i believe is possible to do for physical property, but not for intellectual monopolies. Yes, property is a moral claim, that it its sole purpose. Property means "My use of this is right, and if you use it, it's wrong, and I have remedy against you". Property therefore is compleley a "conceptual thing", whether applying to physical or intellectual objects. Using the term "intellectual monopolies" is a bit loaded. Yes, property is the exclusive (i.e. monopolistic) control over the subject. This is true of physical property rights as well as intellectual. I enjoy a monopoly on the use of my land and house, for example. I don't like using the term "monopoly" in this context however, because it has another important definition in economics. I'll work on a definition of property that will hold.

First let me express how much I appreciate this dialog. I don't mean to frustrate you by being inconsistent. I'm here to test, argue, modify, possibly even abaondon my theory completely. Second, let me admit that my starting point for my entire thesis is nothing more than a gut feeling about what is right and wrong. It is my sympathy and empathy at work, which are wholly subjective human emotions. Of course, that is the starting point for physical property. We sympathize and empathize with victims of aggression, and wonder if maybe there's something called ethics that might allow us to label certain human actions as "right" and "wrong". I'll work on a rigorus definition of IP, that will actually have to be the grand conclusion of the thesis. I'm limited in time today, in fact I have final exams. For now, let's contemplate the difference between the brain and the mind, while I attempt a rough draft of the definitions. Intellectual Space - An abstract, yet objectively understandable theoretical array of unique locations. Intellectual Matter - That which can be understood through language. Intellectual Object - an ascertainable bounded pattern of intellectual matter, temporally stable and cohesive such that it can be reliably identified and distinguished from surrounding intellectual matter. Intellectual Property - a previously un-owned intellectual object that has been transformed into usefulness and declared owned by a human.

Is intellectual property meaningless like "spiritual property" or "magical property"? No. The best evidence for the existence of intellectual property is also the same best evidence for the non-existence of God and magic. Are you ready? We know intellectual matter and a property rights to it exist because people act like it exists. In particular, people voluntarily contract for it, and are routinely satisfied with the performance of the contract. And if you get right down to it, human action is the fundamental way we know phsycial matter exists. Don't people act as though God exists? No, they really don't. Sure, many people SAY they believe in God. But I've yet to become aware of a person who contracted in reliance on a miracle.

We really should contemplate the electromagnetic spectrum, because there's currently a vast amount of information there, and the contemplation will help our understanding. Think of it like water. First imagine that the water is very still, glassy on top. Toss one pebble in, and watch the wave ripple from the center outward in all directions. The water is matter, molecules of H2O. But is the wave matter? The wave is flowing through the water, but the individual molecules of water do not travel along the wave. Not at all. The wave is a phenomena, and it is something different than the water. Now imagine that you create a pattern in the waves. A big one, then a little one, then two big ones. You see? You can encode information in the waves. Are water waves matter? No, not really. And radio waves are certainly not matter. Honestly, we don't know actually what the electromagnetic spectrum "is". But we know that it propagates waves. Now go back to the crucial aspects of property. For something to be property, it must be ascertainable, controllable, and useful. The only thing ascertainable in the electromagnetic spectrum are the patterns of information flowing through it. The patterns are there, we can objectively, scientifically measure them, distinguish them, control them, predict them, and most importantly, we VALUE them. We can buy them, and sell them. And yet, there is nothing remotely physical about them.

Right, so for number one, you show that it is possible to copy someone's machine and not violate their property rights if you are invited onto their property, or you can see it without needing to be on their property. For number two, you are saying that there is a violation of property right, even if no theft occurs. Comparing it to your example, if someone hacks your system and "deletes (re-arranges the 1s and 0s on your comptuer)" your files, there is a violation in property right. We don't need to invent a term called intellectual property when property works just as well. Am I missing your point? Yes, you're missing the point. I may invite you onto my physical property without inviting you onto my intellectual property, and vice versa. I could say, "come on to my land and hang out, but don't you dare copy my machine". I could say "Here's the schematic for my machine, you have my persmission to copy it, but don't come to my house". Making a physical copy of something embodying my intellectual property without permission requires that you trespass upon my unique, homesteaded intellectual property. Only by assuming that Intellectual objects cannot be property can you avoid this. As to #2, there's no such phsycial thing as a "1" or a "0", these are intellectual concepts. What is "on" a hard drive is patterns of magnetism, so you're arguing that magnetism is physical. That's a bit of a stretch, given the current lack of understaning about quantum mechanics, but let's change the example slightly to drive the point home. Instead of a hard drive, let's consider the eletromagnetic spectrum. Patterns of information can be transmitted in the form of radio waves. I would argue that the property is in the pattern. Are you prepared to argue that the electromagnetic spectrum is something physical?

I'm the one who said IP needs a container. When you say the above, you're really just stating a definition. According to you, property is, by definition, physical. You simply define IP out of existence. You're free to do that, but consider the following hypothetical and questions if you please. __________ Suppose you are a computer programmer and have worked long and hard developing some code. Assume that the code is very useful, and that many people will be very eager to pay to use it, but you have not yet released it in any form. I am your competitor, and from my own home I hack into your computer system, copy your code and save it onto my own hard drive, and then I delete the code from your hard drive, and I delete all of your backups too. I then proceed to successfully market the code, and I make $1 million. 1. Have I violated your physical property rights? Specifically, have I stolen any of your physical property? 2. Have I done anything wrong at all? If yes, what would you call it? 3. Are you entitled to any form of remedy at law? If yes, under what theory?

That's the "container" argument, which I answered up-thread. I can't figure out how to link to specific posts, although my email notifications prove it is possible. You're arguing that if X requires a physical container to be useful, then X cannot be property. Try applying that argument to gasoline or orange juice, and see what you come up with.

I can measure the physical characteristics of matter (mass, charge, momentum, color, density, etc). This tells me that physical matter is indistinguishable from something that physically exists. That's good enough for me. First, note that you are using physical aparatus to measure physical things. You must assume the existence of the physical things prior to measuring the physcial things. You must assume certain characteristics about the physical apparatus. If you're measuring the length of an object, you must assume that your ruler stays the same length and doesn't spontaneously change shape on you. The basis for the whole thing is an apriori assumption that what appears to be the case to our physical senses is in fact the case. I am willing to make that assumption with respect to physcial things, indeed, we must. But then you must allow the same type of assumptions for intellectual matter. If our physical senses can be trusted to understand and conceptualize physical matter, then our intellectual senses can be trusted to understand and conceptualize intellectual matter. Therefore . . . I can measure the intellectual characteristics of intellectual matter (melodic shape, harmonic structure, plot structure, character development, overall complexity, internal consistency, objectivity, etc.). This tells me that intellectual matter is indistinguishable from something that intellectually exists. That's good enough for me.

Thanks for the link, I'm familiar with tort law as currenty pracitced in a statist regime. Though I won't get into too many details, my personal hell with IP violation referenced above was a legally complex situation involving author, corporate publisher, a corporate master owner, performance rights organizations, a corporate copyright infringer, and a sub-contractor. Although my remedies at law could theoretically have been quite large, it would have involved severing a substantial business relationship, to my extreme detriment. The purpose here is to discuss IP in a free society. Thank you for saying that you believe violations of IP rights are compensable. I agree.

If we are going to make progress, you will need to convince me that "intellectual space" exists and that it has "locations". Then you will need to explain to me how you can know that multiple copies of the same song occupy the same location in intellectual space. I think the answer must be that we know intellectual property exists because humans act as though it does, specifically they voluntarily contract about it. But let's work through it. The same "existence" problem occurs in the physical realm too, of course. Please give me your answer to an existentialist, or a quantuum physicist who denies that physical matter exists. My (dare I say original) approach to intellectual property, as you know, is always to ask the same question about physical matter, answer it, then substitute intellectual matter. How do we know physical matter exists?

Does not compute. Violence against a person causes damage to their peace of mind (at least), leaving the person unable to function normally. Whatever the cost of that 'unable to function normally' is at least the value of the damages to be awareded. A psychological assessment could be done to determine some degree of trauma and an award made on that basis. When I duplicate someones DVD they are probably not even aware that it happened, have lost nothing, so how can they have any legitimate grievances to redress? When someone violates my intellectual property, and I'm aware of it, I feel utterlly violated, degraded, damaged, hurt, abused, angry, and sad. I cannot function normally. You have no idea of how much anger and sadness I have experienced in my real life due to exactly this occurrence. If this does not resonate with you, you lack empathy, and are potentially a sociopath. Whether and when I become aware of a violation against me is important, but a different issue. Is it your position that a rapist who drugs a victim unconscious has not committed an offense?

My guess for a rape victim is that at least they would be owed money for therapy, loss of earnings, medical expenses and emotional distress. There could be more damages on that as well. Demostrating that the offence took place could be challenging as it is now unless there is unequivable supporting evidence of some kind. Assume in the rape case that 10 people saw it happen, plus there is a DNA match on the perpetrator. But also assume that there was no bruising or bleeding or any other apparent physical damage to the rape victim's body. Forumlate a method by which a private DRO can first establish that rape is a violation of the victim's right to self-ownership, then a method by which the DRO could determine damages. I think that you will conclude that rape is a form of trespass. Now assume intellectual property exists, and that unauthorized use of a victim's IP is trespass. Arrive at an answer to your question on private IP enforcement by the same method. Make sense?

Sorry, this doesn't help. As argued, it may be true but it misses the point. If I copy something, it doesn't invalidate the concept of property (physical or otherwise). You still own the original piece of property, and in addition to that I now own a copy of your property. You can't really make useful analogies between physical and "intellectual" property, because the term "physical property" is used to refer to one instantiation of the item, whereas the term "intellectual property" refers to any number of instantiations of the same idea/creation/process. Absent a consideration of the Doctrine of Intellectual Space, Matter and Property, what you say here is correct. Considering the Doctrine, what you say is incorrect. There are not, and cannot be multiple "instantiations" of an intellectual object. Each is unique. If I write a song, I have transformed previously unowned intellectual matter in a way that is useful, thus homesteading a new piece of property. This piece of intellectual property exists in a unique location in intellectual space, distinct from every other object and every other location in intellectual space. Regardless of how many copies of the song are made in the physical world, the intellectual property cannot be duplicated. Thinking that there could possibly be multiple instances of a piece of intellectual property makes no more sense than saying that there could be multiple instances of a piece of property located at some particular geographical coordinates. The coordinates specify a unique location in phsyical space. An intellectual property object exists at a unique location in intellectual space.

Copying is copying. Example 1: You see your neighbor making a new type of chair, and you make one too (by copying the process that you saw). Example 2: You hear your neighbor performing a new piece of music, and you perform it too (by copying the sounds that you heard). In neither case was there trespass, nor theft. You are simply making assertions founded on your initial assumption that there is no intellectual property. In a following post, I give a step-by-step example explaining how copying of property is trespass. I will grant you that one could also copy something that is not property, which would not be trespass. In your above examples, it is not clear whether I have or have not homesteaded and established my property rights in either the physical or intellectual objects.

If you come onto my property per my invitation, you have not violated my property rights. This holds for both types of property. If you come onto my property without invitation, you have violated my property rights, even prior to the time when you begin rearranging my property. Your rearranging my property IS damage, despite your claim otherwise, and would be relevant to the issue of your liability for my damages. This holds for both types of property.

This is one of the CRUCIAL points that I am going to make. The "copying = theft" construction is wrong, and has been a source of endless wrong thinking on all side of this debate forever. Are you ready? (Clears throat . . . ) Copying is trespass, not theft. (This holds for physical as well as intellectual property). Both types of property can be stolen, both types can be trespassed upon. Imagine you owned a piece of land with a factory on it. Uninvited, I come to your factory, and study all the machines you have operating. I then go to my own piece of land, and build my own factory, which is an exact copy of yours. Consider the following questions. Have I violated your physical property rights? Yes, I trespassed. By definition, a property owner has the right to exclude others. Does my copy of your factory deprive you of the use of your factory? No, you still have your factory. Does the fact that I copied your physical objects somehow prove that physical objects are not scarce, and thus eliminate the need for property rights? No, physical objects are scarce, despite the fact that they can be copied. If the ability to copy physical objects does not invalidate the concept of physical property, then why should the ability to copy intellectual objects invalidate the concept of intellectual property? Therefore, the argument stemming from “copying is not theft” is a non-sequitor founded on a faulty analogy. Can IP be stolen? Yes. As discussed, copying per se is not theft, it is trespass. But IP can in fact be stolen, further supporting the proposition that IP is property. Suppose you are a computer programmer and have worked long and hard developing some code. I am your competitor, and I hack into your computer system, copy your code and save it onto my own hard drive, and then I delete the code from your hard drive, and I delete all of your backups too. Have I violated your physical property rights? Specifically, have I stolen any of your physical property? No, your computer hardware is still right there where it was before, available for your use. And yet, because of my actions, you no longer have use of your computer code. Only by recognizing a property right in IP can we conclude that copying and deleting your code is theft.

Let's try this formulation: "If X isuseful, and Y is a duplicate of X, and the use of Y does not interfere with theuse of X, then "X together with all its present and future duplicates" cannot be property." Kia car 1 is useful, and Kia car 2 is useful, and the use of Kia car 2 does not interfere with the use of Kia car 1, therefore Kia car 1, Kia car 2, and all present and future duplicates cannot be property. Sorry, that does not hold.

What restitution is owed to a rape victim? Is it your position that a free-market DRO would be unable to provide remedy to a rape victim?