Sorry, intellectual property is not the "lifeblood of Western economic success." Freedom of expression, free markets, and the rule of law are.

Great post otherwise. Gates' statements are nothing short of technocrat manifesto. Disgusting.

Don't buy a Mac. Just use bootleg Gatesoft software. That's what I do. I'll start paying for it when it stops crashing. Every time I get a blue screen I add two weeks to the date I'll pay. I've used all the way from 95 to XP now and never paid a dime yet. I'm a firm believer in try before you buy, you wouldn't buy a car without a test drive would you?

Property rights are a fundamental key to economic success, anonymous.

Yeah, China has a new form of capitalism alright. Capitalism without all that mucking about with freedom, rights, and whatnot. Bill Gates is such a frigging douche bag.

I have been to China several times with US sports teams, and I can't help but chime in with a few observations.

China today is a wierd combination of old and new, of freedom and control, of Adam Smith and Stalin. A visitor to a south China city might say that the modern look and the evident economic progress make even our most modern cities seem old and slow.

And yet, 50 miles outside of town peasants work the rice fields in the same old way, fighting for existance.

I have met the party elite and seen the corruption. I've had my hotel rooms bugged, I've talked to expatriate chinese athletes who dare not win in China for fear of promised reprisals against family still in China. (Yes, people still vanish there) I have also seen the "benefits" of the single shopkeeper, and the power of the military controled - singularly corrupt, if cost effective - major factory complex.

Too much is made of the trappings of economic progress, and not enough of the lack of freedom necessary to sustain it over the long run.

As much as China today is the land of plenty for party members and other elite, so it is also, still, on the backs of others. It is the others that toil on in proverty, not much different than the Mao days, and who have no freedom and no voice, and not much hope for them.

Saying that any Microsoft property should be afforded intellectual property righs would be implying that there's and intellect involved. That's why I have absolutely no problem using pirated Microsoft bluescreen generators. That goes hand in hand with my belief that doctors should have the decency to not send out a bill to a dead patient's family.

Two disagreements with this post:

(1) Bill Gates doesn't know much of anything about technology. He just happened to be in the right place at the right time; and he knew enough to take advantage of the situation.

(2) "Intellectual Property" is not property, nor does it in any way fulfill the intent of the Founding Fathers in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. Both Copyright and, to a lesser extent Patent laws, have been bastardized beyond any recognition for the benefit of the law profession.

Other than that, your post was dead on. Bill Gates is no less Left-leaning than anyone else in California. He's just a lot richer than most of them.

I don't know how much he has kept up with current technology, but early in the tech revolution (birth of the PC) Gates was considered to be one of the best programmers of his time.

Stephen Levy's 'Hackers' is a great book, by the way.

Dave at Garfield Ridge wrote what others will be writing about with befuddlement 5 years from now - How did we let a small class of wealthy owners in America buy out both political parties and de-industrialize the US and make the US the world's largest debtor nation and also destroy the dollar as the global currency?

Why did we let them transfer technology and say it was equitable to pit US labor with it's health care, safety, and environmental costs and the right to organize and bargain against 3rd world nations where no environmental, health care, collective bargaining arraingements exist? Where wages in places like China are negiotated by those with Party Power and possession of all the guns?

Because it further enriches the rich, who dribble some of their gains into hungry Republican and Democratic politicians eager mouths as long as they keep the borders open to illegal immigration and all jobs are bid to the lowest cost 3rd world nation in a race to the bottom wage possible....with globalization. And most of the savings of labor costs go primarily to the small class of true owners, not the consumers.

No wonder that shitty computer crapware monopolist geek is happy. He is cutting health benefits at Microsoft while farming out all new company job growth to India and China - while transferring code and technology if they send back more short-term bucks by cutting back on piracy practices..

Hey Cedarford,

At which point are the Zionists to blame? Surely they fit into your scenario somewhere?

Senator Pali-land Seizer -

Why, I refrained from criticizing the one nation and one people you claim are above all criticism!! Since the focus is on the real long-term threat - China - rather than the usual ME obsession.

You should be happy that your delicate dual loyalty sensibilities were not offended.

But if you must bring up the source of your fealty - surely you noticed the news reports about Zionist fanatics threatening Sharon's life and mass civil disobedience if he starts the Gaza withdrawal. To a real Zionist, any scrap of land they can get is future wealth, and it will be as difficult prying their fingers off Gaza and other Colonies as prying their fingers off a sack of ill-gotten diamonds.

Beck said: "Property rights are a fundamental key to economic success, anonymous."

I totally agree, but *intellectual* property rights as we know them are not. Limited IP protection is good, but IP as it exists today is actually a drag on creativity and growth.

RE: Intellectual property.

I apologize for the lack of clarity in my post. I should have said that intellectual property is the lifeblood of Western economic success *TODAY*.

If freedom of expression, free markets, and the rule of law were all necessary to make a buck, then China wouldn't be growing as fast as they can.

However, the question here is what is *sustainable* growth. China's growth may not be sustainable in the long run, especially once you factor in their energy requirements.

No, my point about IP is simple: the Western world is not a manufacturing-centric economy any longer. Yes, we still do manufacturing-- and do it quite well-- but the last thirty years have led to the hybrid information/service economy we have today. Contrary to what the Unions/Dems believe, that's not a bad thing-- if anything, it's been a *great* thing.

Nostalgia may make it seem like thirty years ago things weren't all that different, but I could list a whole slew of things we wouldn't have today without the post-manufacturing explosion in wealth. When we've reached a point in our nation's history that the practical definition of poverty is the inability to subscribe to cable televison, that's progress.

Alas, what this progress is built on-- computing, biotech, scientific research-- is not a tangible resource. It's not iron ore, or car parts. It's all ideas, ideas that can be stolen at a fraction of the cost of their development.

China is engaging in nothing less than the intellectual rape of Western civilization. As a good free market man I'd have no problem with this, if they paid for it. But they are not.

And, like all free rides, the question is, if that well dried up, would they still be able to ride? They're making a lot of cash by doing-- but are they *learning*? And, more importantly, even if they do learn-- and tens of thousands of Chinese exchange students in America most certainly are-- can those students return to China and make use of what they've learned?

Perhaps I'm a bit of a xenophobe at heart, but part of me worries about Chinese-- and Indian, and even Indonesian-- democracy. If those nations ever took the steps necessary to unleash their own intellectual capital-- the free expression, the free markets, the rule of law (i.e., PROPERTY law-- often intellectual property law)-- they could swamp America in the next century. 300 million free people thinking up new ideas vs. over 2 billion free people thinking up new ideas-- once quality is equal, the odds favor quantity.

If they're friends, I'm not worried about it. But if they're not. . .

Cheers,
Dave at Garfield Ridge

Nevertheless, it still remains that "Intellectual Property" is not property. It's like talking about dry water. And it certainly is not the job of government to ensure the success of business models. Those who find a valuable business model as long as it works. But when businesses need government to keep making money, those businesses should simply die in a free market economy.

Sorry, that should have been, "Those who find a valuable business model are welcome to it as long as it works."

PlacidPundit--

I'm not an economist, and I'm not a lawyer, so I apologize if I've gotten myself in over my head here. . . but I don't understand what you just said.

Perhaps you're getting at some sort of Randian libertarian ideal, but here, on Earth, ideas *can* be protected by laws written by governments.

Or, at least until recently, they could be.

Now, your idea of a wonderful world may be the utopian ideal of free downloads of everything, whether it be music or pharmaceutical formulas. I would certainly agree that advances in information technology make it more difficult for the traditional means of IP protection to function. Patent law was not designed with the internet in mind.

That said, what is the solution? I'm genuinely asking, as I don't know what it is.

But if I create wealth-- whether it be machine tools or Doom 3-- I'm entitled to profit from that wealth, aren't I? If not, then the result is not capitalism. And last I checked, piracy of ideas is not capitalism-- it is NOT free market-- it's anarchy.

Again, I'm not going to say that anarchy is undesirable, as it may be unavoidable. A new economic system will undoubtedly emerge.

But for anyone to say there's no such thing as "intellectual property" in Western economy smacks a lot of saying "We've always been at war with Eurasia." Saying it's so doesn't make it true.

Then again, what am I missing here? Please, someone explain, using small words and pretty lights, if available.

Thanks,
Dave at Garfield Ridge

Senator Pali-land Seizer? I actually sort of like that name, Cedarford. Or not the name so much as the idea behind it.

I never claimed any nation or any people are above criticism, Cedar. That's one of your paranoid delusions. At some point every country and every group of people does something to deserve a verbal smackdown.

Especially the Icelanders. They killed Thor and they spawned Bjork. Hardly a fair trade. Stupid hot spring soaking, halibut chomping, pumice mining, parka fucks.

Actually, regarding China, I'm fairly hostile. Should they move on Taiwan, I would respond aggresively were the decision mine to make.

As for the bane of your existence, Israel, not only do I think that Israel should keep all land they currently possess, I think they should get the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights back as well.

And guess what, Cedar, I'm not even Jewish. Neither am I Taiwanese. I'm just a guy who, if I am in error, would rather err on the side of democracies and freedom than on the side of theocrats and fascists. Pity the same cant be said for you.

Dave:

I'm most certainly not advocating any kind of utopian vision.

If you give me your car, you are no longer able to use it. If you give me an idea, or several ideas, or a lot of data, you can still use it. In other words, you cannot be deprived of the use of your information.

"But wait," you say, "I can no longer sell access to that information and make money! I'm being deprived of my money!" No. You may still sell access to your information. Depending on the price, people may or may not be willing to buy access to it.

But that has nothing to do with the status of the information itself. Information still does not partake of the "deprivability" nature as physical property does.

There is other evidence for Intellectual Property not being a property right. The Founders of this nation understood that property rights were essential to the existence of freedom. Most of the same men wrote the first copyright and patent legislation in 1791. You were allowed exclusive rights to copy your information for a period of 14 years, renewable for another 14 years. And that was it. After a maximum of 28 years, you lost all exclusive rights to copy your material. You still could copy it, of course, but you now were open to competition from fellow publishers.

However, they made no such law concerning land. No one could come farm your land after 14 or 28 years. They would have laughted at such a concept.

Furthermore, Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution ("Enumerated Powers") specifically grants Congress the power to pass certain kinds of legislation. Since the Founders viewed natural law rights (like property rights) as originating in God, the placement of permission for Congress to protect Intellectual Property makes no sense. Congress would not have been permitted to administer Copyright--they would have been enjoined to not interfere with it in the Bill of Rights.

Copyright and Patent can be seen as time-limited artificial government monopolies. That is, they are explicitly limited in time, they are created by government, and they do not arise through any natural market process. They are quite simply not property rights, or rights of any kind.

So even if you believe in natural law, no government could ever be legitimately forced to enact and enforce these laws on a moral basis (though they frequently are so forced on the basis of international treaties).

Further, there lie two questions: (1) should these laws exist; and (2) if so, what should their nature be?

(1) Should these laws exist? They certainly are artificial constraints on a free market. That almost never works out well in the end. It's too complicated for human governments to try to control. And I don't think they have worked terribly well for content providers or for consumers. Perhaps if they were reformed to be closer to their original intent. Which leads us to...

(2) If so, what should their nature be? First, the length of the protection needs to be drastically reduced. It's been extended over and over and over; content providers like Disney still want to make money on Winnie the Pooh and Mickey Mouse. Do they have a right to keep milking it? Not in my opinion--copyright was intended to spur new creative effort.

The original term of two 14 year periods was necessary because mass communication and transport were very slow. It would take years to print a book and distribute it. Now, copyrighted works can be disseminated much more quickly. A single term of 5 years, renewable only once for a period of 3 years sounds about right.

The penalties also need to return to the civil realm. Originally, if someone infringed your copyright, you had the power to sue him or her in a civil court. We are seeing more attempts to turn this into a criminal offense, which is simply ridiculous.

So there's PlacidPundit's solution. Now tort reform...