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How should I have protected my invention?


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Why not just sell your ideas to the tyre producer? If you can show them the cost-benefit analysis of switching to your improvement then they can figure out what it's worth. So you go around get some offers and strike whichever deal you find is best. (Or am I missing something here?)

Also, and I wanted to mention that in the other thread as well: I think one of the best investment you could make at the moment is in self-knowledge. Though I'm not really sure how I'd make an actual case for that right now, ha, sorry about that. But I think as a general rule (and I think Stef even has an interview with someone about that) it is quite an investment with quite a good longterm benefit. (ah, yeah, there it is

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The logical logging patent was enforced for 22 years.

Patents last 20 years, but since it takes 5 years to get them, it is more like 15 years. In the US they give you a couple extra years when the examiners were slow, but this is the only place.

What makes you think we want an alternative? I can't speak for anyone else, but I certainly do not want them to be replaced by anything.

So you want patents to be gone, period. Suppose a guy invents a solar panel that has a 90% efficiency, it does not bother you that all the manufacturers immediately copy it?

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So you want patents to be gone, period. Suppose a guy invents a solar panel that has a 90% efficiency, it does not bother you that all the manufacturers immediately copy it?

No.

 

I mean, I don't accept the premise exactly, but even drawing it out, the short answer is still no.

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No.

 

I mean, I don't accept the premise exactly, but even drawing it out, the short answer is still no.

Why should you respect the property of someone? Suppose a guy leaves his house empty for six months, why shouldn't you take it?

 

Personally, even in the absence of patents, if someone invents a new revolutionary solar panel and I manufacture solar panels, I would not feel too good to steal his idea, and particularly right away. I find it sad to learn that great inventors like Tesla or a more modest inventor like the one who invented the sewing machine died broke. But I guess this is because I am manipulative, immoral, I support the violence, I am a savvy investor, I want to receive money for nothing, and I do not understand philosophy.

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I think it has been brought up before but I don't think it has been answered here. If someone invents a revolutionary solar panel, but is an incompetent manufacturer that cannot meet demand, should all the other solar panels be forced not to innovate in a similar direction simply because they didn't think of it first?

 

What if Galileo had patented his telescope (he didn't) and then proceeded not to manufacture any for anyone else because he was only interested in his research? Would anyone have bothered to recreate his results?

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Why should you respect the property of someone? Suppose a guy leaves his house empty for six months, why shouldn't you take it?

 

Personally, even in the absence of patents, if someone invents a new revolutionary solar panel and I manufacture solar panels, I would not feel too good to steal his idea, and particularly right away. I find it sad to learn that great inventors like Tesla or a more modest inventor like the one who invented the sewing machine died broke. But I guess this is because I am manipulative, immoral, I support the violence, I am a savvy investor, I want to receive money for nothing, and I do not understand philosophy.

Ideas aren't property.

 

Self pity really doesn't help your case.

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I don't know, sell tires that people voluntarily want to buy...

Why is that not an option for you?

Great thinking. If someone invents a new steering wheel, will you tell him to sell cars?

Ideas aren't property.

 

Self pity really doesn't help your case.

Whereas being mean helps yours?

I think it has been brought up before but I don't think it has been answered here. If someone invents a revolutionary solar panel, but is an incompetent manufacturer that cannot meet demand, should all the other solar panels be forced not to innovate in a similar direction simply because they didn't think of it first?

 

What if Galileo had patented his telescope (he didn't) and then proceeded not to manufacture any for anyone else because he was only interested in his research? Would anyone have bothered to recreate his results?

If he had patented his telescope improvement (he did not invent telescopes), then, he would have had a monopoly on his improvement between 1609 and 1629. It would have also been in his interest that other people benefit from his invention during that period because he made money selling telescopes.

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I don't know if you misse the question or if you evaded it on purpose, so again: Why not just sell your ideas to the tyre producer? If you can show them the cost-benefit analysis of switching to your improvement then they can figure out what it's worth. So you go around get some offers and strike whichever deal you find is best. (Or am I missing something here?)

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What is better for the consumer?

 

 

What I believe is better for consumers it to prevent the creation of institutions that enjoy a monopoly on initiating violence against people to prevent them from carrying out voluntary transactions.  Especially when such institutions, being able to arrogate power to themselves, tend to never function in a manner consistent with the pretense they were sold to the public under.

 

Are you starting from the concept of a stateless society and then trying to determine how to create something akin to patent law?  Or are you talking about what could replace patent law now in the existing state controlled society?

 

If you mean in a stateless society, you would have to make a rock solid case and present it all over the place and get people to agree to it.  It would probably come down to getting business owners to agree with shunning people who violate it.

 

If you mean in a state controlled society, all you're doing is holding a gun and asking other people to come up with better solutions that you get to agree with, if they want you to put the gun down or aim it elsewhere.

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If he had patented his telescope improvement (he did not invent telescopes), then, he would have had a monopoly on his improvement between 1609 and 1629. It would have also been in his interest that other people benefit from his invention during that period because he made money selling telescopes.

 

But his interest was actually in other people reproducing his results and moving forward the understanding of the universe. Patenting his product would not have advanced that interest, it would have retarded it.

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Great thinking. If someone invents a new steering wheel, will you tell him to sell cars?


Whereas being mean helps yours?


If he had patented his telescope improvement (he did not invent telescopes), then, he would have had a monopoly on his improvement between 1609 and 1629. It would have also been in his interest that other people benefit from his invention during that period because he made money selling telescopes.

hahaha You call him mean...

 

What about all those poor Tesla engineers who had their patents opened up to the public, how will they put dinner on the table?

 

I hear Tesla is going bankrupt cuz they can't sell any cars because detroit is making so many awesome electric cars and undercutting their prices by using their own technology...

 

What's that you say? Tesla is kicking ass and innovating more than all their competitors.

The only things really standing in their way are governments trying to protect entrenched interests... funny enough patents also protect entrenched interests.

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I don't know if you misse the question or if you evaded it on purpose, so again: Why not just sell your ideas to the tyre producer? If you can show them the cost-benefit analysis of switching to your improvement then they can figure out what it's worth. So you go around get some offers and strike whichever deal you find is best. (Or am I missing something here?)

 

I could attempt to answer that - Without a patent all you are selling is the value of being first to sell your product within the market. The value that this would give is probably smaller to what Jean thinks he is entitled to as he lives in a world with patients, when you take something away it is common for people to feel t"hey are getting a bad deal" / "it isn't fair".

 

JeanPaul

Ideas are only worth the first to market advantage, unless you are willing to do the rest of the entrepreneurial work or form a partnership with someone (where you think of the ideas and they do the rest of the work) of course the amount to which you can profit from an idea is rightfully quite limited.

 

An alternative way to make money from an idea without the third party threat of force is as follows - Contact the big guys in the manufacturing industry and draw up a contract with all of them to how much they would be interested in paying you upfront or per unit sold for a pre-agreed length of time. This would only be more profitable than the first to market advantage if the markets price elasticity is such that cheaper or better products would result in significantly higher profits and thus the big guys would be willing to pay for this perhaps not as much as you like but whats that got to do with anything. For this to be possible the market would probably need quite big (non aggressive) barriers to entry such as investment, infrastructure and brand loyalty ect.

 

At the end of the day the people driving the demand for innovation should be the consumers if the consumers want better things you could determine the value of an idea through crowd funding you could even team up with other inventors of different parts if the end product is complex like a car or a computer so customers make a stronger link to what they are supporting and thus are likely to give more.

 

This is what comes to my mind right now and what I have said could very well be invalidated by future innovation heck if it wasn't for bit coin I personally would be asking for the gold standard in a currency for a free society...

 

My ideal goal isn't to have the best tech it is to live in a society without the initiation or threat of force this might very well come at the cost of having slower innovation when we remove the artificial (can only be achieved through force) increased value of ideas - patents. I would argue that the free market would more than make up for this in other ways due to more market freedom allowing more competition which is the breading place for innovation. Should we keep inflation as it artificially increases the rate at which consumers spend their money because their money is always loosing value?

 

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What about all those poor Tesla engineers who had their patents opened up to the public, how will they put dinner on the table?

 

I hear Tesla is going bankrupt cuz they can't sell any cars because detroit is making so many awesome electric cars and undercutting their prices by using their own technology...

 

What's that you say? Tesla is kicking ass and innovating more than all their competitors.

The only things really standing in their way are governments trying to protect entrenched interests... funny enough patents also protect entrenched interests.

 

This too advanced philosophy for me.

 

I had, or thought I had, a real interest in libertarianism and philosophy, now I am done with both. It is not for me. I do not have the intellectual foundation. I do not think I will ever be an empiricist and a rationalist. I will stick to my tyres and try hard to make driving better, safer and more economical (I provided figures and scenarios even). This is neither empirical, nor rational, but this is my only a goal. I won't care if it is a bad goal on an empirical and rational level. My ideas are so twisted now. Since trying hard to make driving better, safer and more economical in my case leads to use of immoral use of initiation of the use of force, I came to the conclusion that trying hard to make driving worse, more dangerous and less economical in my case might lead to moral use of no initiation of the use of force.

 

Thank you for your time. I wish you all all the best and happy driving to everyone!

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Well the method is simple, you sign a contract with anyone you show the prototype to saying they agree not to use the ideas without compensating you for them.  A mix of a non-disclosure and non-compete clause would do the trick.  Once sold, that company should be under no obligation to report how they improved their tires, but simply that they did improve them.  Then its up to the other companies to reverse engineer it, which takes time, giving the first company the leg up.  

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The topic is complex enough without bringing inflation into it. It is only tangential to this thread.

 

The gold standard vs bitcoin reference was to show how innovation can make previous ideas pretty redundant.

The question at the end was a rhetorical question to make a point not open a new discussion...

 

...

 

Well the method is simple, you sign a contract with anyone you show the prototype to saying they agree not to use the ideas without compensating you for them.  A mix of a non-disclosure and non-compete clause would do the trick.  Once sold, that company should be under no obligation to report how they improved their tires, but simply that they did improve them.  Then its up to the other companies to reverse engineer it, which takes time, giving the first company the leg up.  

 

Exactly this is one (and probably the best way to do it) you are selling the ticket to be first / one of the first within the market.

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One last question. I understood that there would be no patents in this stateless/libertarian/utopian society. But then, why should there be copyright?

 

As was pointed out, there should only be "copyright" if you contract with someone to share something they agree not to disclose to others.

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Well the method is simple, you sign a contract with anyone you show the prototype to saying they agree not to use the ideas without compensating you for them.  A mix of a non-disclosure and non-compete clause would do the trick.  Once sold, that company should be under no obligation to report how they improved their tires, but simply that they did improve them.  Then its up to the other companies to reverse engineer it, which takes time, giving the first company the leg up.  

What if the invention cannot lead to a prototype? Thinking that all inventions can lead to a prototype is limiting. Inventions nowadays are no longer limited to contraptions.

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What if the invention cannot lead to a prototype? Thinking that all inventions can lead to a prototype is limiting. Inventions nowadays are no longer limited to contraptions.

 

Inventions that don't lead to something useful are kind of pointless. May as well be a hobby.

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What if the invention cannot lead to a prototype? Thinking that all inventions can lead to a prototype is limiting. Inventions nowadays are no longer limited to contraptions.

 

Sure, like designing a website or an app?  Well.... nothing stops anyone from stealing anything like that.  You can go make your own wikipedia or google or twitter right now

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Designing a website or making an app is clearly not an invention. I am of course talking about inventions that are patentable in nature.

 

Considering that an invention is a priori useless if it cannot lead to a prototype is a strnage idea. My inventions are for example consider highly useful to the persons who pay me royalties. Yet, they are do not lead to prototypes. Thye are not contraptions to put is simply.


Well the method is simple, you sign a contract with anyone you show the prototype to saying they agree not to use the ideas without compensating you for them.  A mix of a non-disclosure and non-compete clause would do the trick.  Once sold, that company should be under no obligation to report how they improved their tires, but simply that they did improve them.  Then its up to the other companies to reverse engineer it, which takes time, giving the first company the leg up.  

A system that encourages competitors to reverse engineer things, instead of encouraging them to innovate and invent new things is not me very sad. I would personally never spend my time and effort to reverse engineer something. I find this activity pitiful and in addition immoral.

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Hello everyone,

 

I have invented a new tyre formulation. I am a chemist. Not only will the tyres last longer but it will slightly reduces the gaz consumption whithout compromising the road holding. The invention consists in adding two new substances in small proportions to the mixture before the "cooking" operation. These substances are not unknown, they are pretty common, but no one had ever thought of adding them in combination in a tyre composition.

 

Suppose I could manufacture such new tyres, it would take 5 minutes using GC-MS to identify the two new components and their respective proportions.

 

Needless to say that I already filed two international patents, and hopefully in a year, you will be using them with your car wihtout even knowing.

 

What would you have done yourself?

 

What should I have done in your patentless society?

I just don't believe your claim.  Material Science is so far beyond simple chemistry, that I can't take anyone serious when they suggest they came up with something new by simply changing the ratios of household chemicals when synthesising a material.  Tires have to be able to handle extreme heat & cold, years of wear and tear, and most importantly do all of that within a safety margin.  So when you say you stumbled on some new, revolutionary material in one of the most highly researched, tested and competitive fields of material related commodities, I am skeptical.

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Okay, well those aren't arguments, right?  So, sorry it makes you feel a certain way.  I find the idea of threatening someone to prevent them from non-aggressive voluntary action repulsive, personally.  

I completely agree with you, thus my presence here and my thread.

 

But I find just as immoral to reverse engineer the work of others, especially if the idea is just to copy. When someone has spent years to perfect something, I find people ready to do whatever it takes to find out how to reproduce it, whether by reverse engineering, analyzing or plain spying, a sad thing and the privilege of people that are not imaginative enough to find new things themselves.

 

It seems to me that without patents, things would be much worse.

 

By the way, no one told me if in a stateless/libertarian society, copyright should also not exist.

 

I just don't believe your claim.  Material Science is so far beyond simple chemistry, that I can't take anyone serious when they suggest they came up with something new by simply changing the ratios of household chemicals when synthesising a material.  Tires have to be able to handle extreme heat & cold, years of wear and tear, and most importantly do all of that within a safety margin.  So when you say you stumbled on some new, revolutionary material in one of the most highly researched, tested and competitive fields of material related commodities, I am skeptical.

I explained what I do more precisely throughout the thread. You would be surprised at how close to working on a recipe it is. My approach is actually more methodical, though modelization, thus my work as an independent consultant. The chemicals that I add to the mix in rigorous proportions, for given tyre formulations, are certainly not household chemicals. The idea behind my work is to make the tyre somehow thyrotrophic. This sounds like a very weird idea, but this is exactly what happens, even though you would not be able to perceive it. At high speed, or when breaking, the tyre material, on a molecular level becomes harder. This prolongs the life of the tyre. At the same time, some proprieties of the soft rubber are maintained throughout the tensile force spectrum. I am the first one to have developed this concept of thyrotrophic like properties on such materials. I modelized the tensile force within the material. Tensile forces are the physical representation of various tyre behaviors, such as high speed, gyration, breaking. Not only can I improve the rubber, bit also optimize interliner shapes. Finding chemical candidates is done though 3D modeling scanning of tens of thousands of molecules and macromolecules. So you see, it is a bit more complex that making scones. Note that all this improves the tyre and tyre rubber behavior very slightly, but slightly enough to be considered of interest for the tyre manufacturer to use my patents. What they then do exactly to their tyres in relation to my patents is their secret. I know actually know a manufacturer I sold a patent to a while ago that never incorporated my technology to his tyres, for I have put through the spectro samples of all his high-end tyres. This was for the anecdote.

 

But what I precisely do, and whether you believe it or not, is of little interest to the discussion, I hope.

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I find just as immoral to reverse engineer the work of others

 

No, you don't think people will pay you for one thing you did, so you attach objective terminology to it to avoid facing the possibility that you are in error. I asked you before about how a patent is basically trying to force others not to do what you yourself have done.

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No, you don't think people will pay you for one thing you did, so you attach objective terminology to it to avoid facing the possibility that you are in error. I asked you before about how a patent is basically trying to force others not to do what you yourself have done.

I do not understand your argument. I am not talking about patents here. I am just saying why I find reverse engineering pitiful. For example, I would never do such a thing, jut in order to copy.

 

Also, could you please tell me if copyright would also not exist in a stateless/libertarian society?

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I completely agree with you, thus my presence here and my thread.

 

But I find just as immoral to reverse engineer the work of others, especially if the idea is just to copy. When someone has spent years to perfect something, I find people ready to do whatever it takes to find out how to reproduce it, whether by reverse engineering, analyzing or plain spying, a sad thing and the privilege of people that are not imaginative enough to find new things themselves.

 

It seems to me that without patents, things would be much worse.

 

By the way, no one told me if in a stateless/libertarian society, copyright should also not exist.

 

I explained what I do more precisely throughout the thread. You would be surprised at how close to working on a recipe it is. My approach is actually more methodical, though modelization, thus my work as an independent consultant. The chemicals that I add to the mix in rigorous proportions, for given tyre formulations, are certainly not household chemicals. The idea behind my work is to make the tyre somehow thyrotrophic. This sounds like a very weird idea, but this is exactly what happens, even though you would not be able to perceive it. At high speed, or when breaking, the tyre material, on a molecular level becomes harder. This prolongs the life of the tyre. At the same time, some proprieties of the soft rubber are maintained throughout the tensile force spectrum. I am the first one to have developed this concept of thyrotrophic like properties on such materials. I modelized the tensile force within the material. Tensile forces are the physical representation of various tyre behaviors, such as high speed, gyration, breaking. Not only can I improve the rubber, bit also optimize interliner shapes. Finding chemical candidates is done though 3D modeling scanning of tens of thousands of molecules and macromolecules. So you see, it is a bit more complex that making scones. Note that all this improves the tyre and tyre rubber behavior very slightly, but slightly enough to be considered of interest for the tyre manufacturer to use my patents. What they then do exactly to their tyres in relation to my patents is their secret. I know actually know a manufacturer I sold a patent to a while ago that never incorporated my technology to his tyres, for I have put through the spectro samples of all his high-end tyres. This was for the anecdote.

 

But what I precisely do, and whether you believe it or not, is of little interest to the discussion, I hope.

Firstly mathematically quantifying scones is hella complex ;)  had a math major friend interned for a cookie company.  Second your rubber material sounds cool.

 

As to the patent system.  I honestly think that if there were no patent system there would be an inventors's guilds.  Basically inventors and entrepeneur would band together for a fee to market new ideas and intellectual properties to companies.  That's my thought, idk if it would be better or worse than the patent system.

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Firstly mathematically quantifying scones is hella complex ;)  had a math major friend interned for a cookie company.  Second your rubber material sounds cool.

 

As to the patent system.  I honestly think that if there were no patent system there would be an inventors's guilds.  Basically inventors and entrepeneur would band together for a fee to market new ideas and intellectual properties to companies.  That's my thought, idk if it would be better or worse than the patent system.

Quantifying rubber is even hella more complex

This guild thing is the first really interesting idea in this thread I think. But then how would we know if such and such really invented something or just copied something they found and tried to sell their stolen ideas to some companies from the guild? We would need here too examiners who could check some invention registry to see if the ideas are new or not.

Also, the guild would work only if most companies belong to it.

 

It seems to me that finding a better and workable alternative to patents is even more complex than improving tyres.

 

By the way, suppose a company infringes a patent knowingly, why can't the patent holder tell the infringing company: you are infringing, please stop doing so until 2020? This is actually already what is often done.

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Quantifying rubber is even hella more complex

This guild thing is the first really interesting idea in this thread I think. But then how would we know if such and such really invented something or just copied something they found and tried to sell their stolen ideas to some companies from the guild? We would need here too examiners who could check some invention registry to see if the ideas are new or not.

Also, the guild would work only if most companies belong to it.

 

It seems to me that finding a better and workable alternative to patents is even more complex than improving tyres.

 

By the way, suppose a company infringes a patent knowingly, why can't the patent holder tell the infringing company: you are infringing, please stop doing so until 2020? This is actually already what is often done.

 

Maybe this can be accomplished through societal ostracism (as in the Downton Abbey video) and/or the bargaining mechanism, borrowing from the DRO concept (in this case, based ultimately on customer choice for patent holders)?  ;)

 

Relevant portion starts at 02:50 for bargaining mechanism:

 

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Also, could you please tell me if copyright would also not exist in a stateless/libertarian society?

 

I have no idea. Since it's the initiation of the use of force, I'm guessing no. How does using the word copyright instead of patent change anything? It's all using threats of violence to artificially cull competition.

 

Your improvement is based off of existing tech while you're talking about forcibly preventing somebody from working with existing tech. That was the question I brought up way back when that you continue to avoid. Shifting to reverse engineering is hardly different. The sum of human knowledge is an exercise of reverse engineering. We wouldn't have doctors without reverse engineering humans for example.

 

Not only did you shift from patent to copyright, and shift from improving to reverse engineering, you've shifted your view of reverse engineering from immoral to pitiful. Have you made ANY effort into looking into why it's so important that nobody do what you can do that you're willing to put this much effort into making it fit into reality instead of adjusting your expectation to match the reality you're in?

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I have no idea. Since it's the initiation of the use of force, I'm guessing no. How does using the word copyright instead of patent change anything? It's all using threats of violence to artificially cull competition.

 

Your improvement is based off of existing tech while you're talking about forcibly preventing somebody from working with existing tech. That was the question I brought up way back when that you continue to avoid. Shifting to reverse engineering is hardly different. The sum of human knowledge is an exercise of reverse engineering. We wouldn't have doctors without reverse engineering humans for example.

 

Not only did you shift from patent to copyright, and shift from improving to reverse engineering, you've shifted your view of reverse engineering from immoral to pitiful. Have you made ANY effort into looking into why it's so important that nobody do what you can do that you're willing to put this much effort into making it fit into reality instead of adjusting your expectation to match the reality you're in?

You cannot compare what you call "reverse engineering the human body", which is actually understanding how the body works, with some people trying to plain copy something that someone else spent 10 years to come up with. Letting someone do all the work and then copying what he did does not seem to be a very moral thing. And please do not always refer to my own activity. We are not talking about what I do, it should just serve as an example.

 

Everyone can do what I do. They just need to get a lab, develop a computerized microscopic physical model. I only encourage people to do the same. The more the merrier.

 

I am not shifting to copyright while still thinking about inventions. I was asking myself how there could still be movies in the absence of copyright. Movies would immediately be distributed for free, or sold by anyone for one dollar as a DVD or through download, as soon as they have hit the market.

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