<ol>
<li> stop using such big words. We all know what they mean, and they’re making you look less intelligent because you’re trying to hide behind them</li>
<li>looking at something and coming up with your own ideas is fine, as long as you’re not copying something that is patented. Again, patented work is patented for a reason. I can’t dive into details about my own work with TI because a lot of their software, and a main project I’m working on, is VERY patented because it is unique in how it works. Other companies, including TI, have made systems that do sort of the same thing, but they’re not very close. Having a system that resembles another system down to technological details is copying. No software can work exactly like another piece of software, without being the same general code. Yes, tweaks can be made here and there, but overall, it’s the same code. You should know this since you’re so interested in CS.
As for your international books, the author WROTE the book. Spent time, money, effort. International printers pay them next to nothing. Why should he lose his work’s profit so you can be all special and not pay so much and be a free economy?</li>
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<p>If you ever sat yourself down in an engineering lab and slaved away for months, years, even decades, to finally get something working, you would be *<strong><em>ed if it was stolen. If you ever wrote a book and never made a dime but others are making tons of money just selling them, you’d be *</em></strong>ed too. I really hope you end up in a line of work where your hard work is what puts food on the table, so that you can realize that if the market is to become so “free”, it screws people over.<br>
You can be innovative and creative and still have patent laws. The computer you’re sitting at has millions of others just like it, but they’re all separated by something that gives them different patents. Also, there’s NOTHING wrong with using patents and others’ ideas, just pay for them. Just because someone else in the world is a bit smarter or quicker than you doesn’t mean they should be screwed over. They should be rewarded, and they are with patents. It spurs someone else to be innovative and come up with their own ideas. Frankly, patents probably fuel creativity.
As for the downgraded quality of products: it would happen if everyone had full access to patents for free. There’s no possible argument against that. And, that would hurt patents because the largest patent holders are or were some of the biggest innovating companies. If they don’t have income, they don’t work, and thus no more good ideas.</p>
<p>PS- stop milking our honor code. THAT is very dishonorable, and upsets UVA kids who actually care what it means, not that it just looks pretty. The Code is not designed to attack anyone who is slightly acting out of the norm. It’s designed to protect people from malicious intent. You said yourself you’re making an argument…now stick to it. It’s starting to upset me severely, and I’m sure others too.</p>
<p>Tyring from a phone again, gosh this will be extra slow. First, how have I used big words? Be specific. As you know, some words are technical for precision. Like in ‘demand’, often consumers won’t actually literally demand things.
Secondly, you have sidestepped my argument totally - I’m saying development costs should be accounted for in other ways, but not through monopolies over the innovation , which is economically inefficient.</p>
<p>Innovators should receive a variable-cost subsidy (in the form of a tax holiday for the product perhaps) for their work - so they they have a huge advantage over others who also use the work. But we don’t own our ideas - we are merely their vessels, as they replicate in individuals as memes. Once passed to someone else, they are out of our moral control.</p>
<ol>
<li> You know what words</li>
<li>Every chance you get you throw out the honor code card. STOP. You should love the actual code, not the concept, and because it’s traditional and the values of UVA. Not because it fits some mold of what you think it stands for.</li>
<li>There’s no possible way every single idea of someone can be replicated by someone else. And there’s no “moral control”. It’s people should be rewarded for their hardwork. If they can translate their ideas into work, it’s all theirs. I suggest you rethink your idea to become an engineer, as you’ll never fit in, and people probably would not want to hire you in fear of your whimsical attitude towards secrecy and patents.</li>
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<p>If I own a computer, I should every right to tinker with it any way I want, as long I don’t hurt others (bombs, pollution, etc.) And I should be prevented from reverse-engineering to my heart’s content to form a new product I want because of IP law?</p>
<p>If someone already created those products you’re using, then yes, you should give credit to those who made them. No one’s preventing you, which is where your argument is all wrong. It’s just you owe the creator credit if you use their thing to make something of your own.</p>
<p>You’re not really into the MIT hacker attitude are you? Secrecy is needlessly inefficient. (When sharing ideas, not passwords.) Take open-source and Wikipedia - the community owns the pages, not the ‘original’ article creator. Everyone receives credit in the page history. People are free to build upon others’ work, and vandalism disappears in a flash. It is the most comprehensive, viral, highly cited encyclopedia out there. How many link to Wikipedia? How many instead cite Britannica?</p>
<p>I never threw out the honor code card. I was accused of the most vile crime there could be. I will love the code, but not having lived under it I can only currently love the concept.</p>
<p>Shoebox, yes I am prevented. Maybe we’re arguing for no reason, for I stressed that hackers (the MIT sense) think that cred is paramount. But maybe you’re not aware of some things that have been brewing in IP law. (The DMCA is only the beginning.) Legally, I can’t tinker with a lot of software I buy, nor can I legally fiddle with DRM hardware stored on my computer, even if it messes up compatibility with Linux.</p>
<p>YES PEOPLE SHOULD BE REWARDED FOR THEIR HARD WORK. But does this translate into granting monopolies? Nay, except literally (freedom of speech), people should have no say about how their ideas get used in derivative works. But of course some sort of market correction should be performed to compensate for the marginal cost of innovation. I would show you how this works out economically, but the margins of this phone are too small to contain it.</p>
<p>I have yet to create embedded systems like you, but I do know great labour is spent creating intellectual property. But this process is even more costly and arduous if you can allow monopolies to hinder the creation of derivative works. I am an administrator on Wikipedia and have spent thousands of hours on research and prose to establish the foundations of hundreds of articles. (Many relate to my home country.) I claim credit for, not ownership of, those edits.</p>
<p>The project flourishes because article ownership is out of the question. There is of course a great deal that goes into user-made maps for videogames, and while you must cite inspiration, why must one be prevented from reverse-engineering other maps? And so forth.</p>
<p>Given that unix and Linux are big things for hackers, I’m surprised at how you shrug it off. It’s my computer! Let me use my own talent! You have the advantage of working for ‘the Man’, who has plenty of capital and market power.</p>
<p>Well maybe now that a night’s sleep has cleared anything that would cloud my judgment…</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Why should patents specifically grant monopolies over the innovation? Shouldn’t patents grant some other economic advantage or compensation? </p></li>
<li><p>None of the ideas we have really are our own – even new ideas are produced from ideas gained from other people, who in turn got them from other people before them. Information is a physical property of the universe that is hard to specifically <em>own</em>. </p></li>
<li><p>Current IP laws prevent reverse-engineering or tweaking with a lot of the devices you are supposed to own – quite a repressive state of affairs.</p></li>
<li><p>Information is different from tangible property, because it is not exhaustible. If I use an idea, other people are free to use it: I can only add to it. (Or in the worst case, I promote general ignorance and all that, but that’s a different story.) In contrast, if I take a Benz, that Benz is gone. </p></li>
<li><p>It seems quite a curious state of affairs when 1) information as a whole could be used to improve all other aspects of society besides the innovator’s, but 2) secrecy is to be promoted in order to have to keep the innovator’s advantage. Is this the best way to reward the innovator and encourage future innovation? Why should granting the innovator a monopoly over the innovation be the standard way of rewarding the innovator? </p></li>
<li><p>Countless hours of work go into scientific research. Suppose I’m rich enough to buy a scientific paper from JSTOR. Another researcher has spent hours laboriously experimenting with spectrograph data in order to find more sophisticated sound patterns that characterise phonemes. I in reading that paper suddenly realise how to build a better voice recognition and synthesiser device by combining the scientist’s theory with other ideas I already know. I heartily cite the researcher in the ensuing paper of my own I release, but do I now owe royalties to the researcher or does the researcher now have moral say over what I do with the idea? Do the current scientists working on the Standard Model owe royalties to the estates of all the physicists of the past? </p></li>
<li><p>Can I propose an alternative to a current state of affairs without being labelled a violator of the Honor Code? </p></li>
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<p>7a. Is every law just? If I say what the law construes as cheating isn’t actually cheating, maybe it’s not because I’m trying to find an excuse to cheat by redefining it, but rather seek a more consistent theory of law???</p>
<p>7b. Should every policy debater be expelled from UVA? Do you think that all of them would (not) like living under an Honor Code?</p>
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<li>And no I’m not intentionally choosing augmented vocabulary. Sheesh. I’m only writing out the points that first come to mind. True synonyms are rare.</li>
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<p>man… I don’t get on for a day and the thread explodes!</p>
<p>I will say that in a theoretical sense I agree with galoisien’s support of libertarianism and Richard Stallman ideals, but I don’t feel like reading all of his posts to make sure that what he is actually saying right here makes any sense. :).</p>