Monday, August 1, 2016

A Guy Who Is Glad I Respect IP as Property

The following email exchange took place today between me and an individual who I will not identify, and  I make other redactions, for reasons that will become obvious.

Hello,

I'm writing in regards to a blog post I was named in, posted              (found here  http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com             .html  )

I was happy to write              but was unaware at the time that they would be published or read by anyone other than their addressed recipients.  I am asking if you could please edit the post to remove my full name               and email address              @gmail.com," which appear in the              letters I wrote.  

I am embarking on a new career that necessitates I not appear politically biased in any way.  This blog post is one of the few hits on google for my name, so I would greatly appreciate it if you could help me with this.  I thank you in advance, and await your response.

Regards,

                          

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​Hi              ,

I think I got them all. If there are any more please let me know.​

Robert Wenzel
Editor & Publisher
San Francisco, CA

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Nope, looks like you go them all.  Thanks so much Robert--I really appreciate it.

Regards,

                       

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You should be glad I respect IP rights. 

The anti-IP crowd would say that because you know what you already wrote you couldn't possibly be harmed :)


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Robert Wenzel
Editor & Publisher
San Francisco, CA

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Haha-- I am very glad.  I also come down on the side of IP rights.  Who would've thought either of us would have something in common with the guys from Metallica?  



12 comments:

  1. It has nothing to do with IP rights, and everything with not being an a*le.

    By the way, what about web.archive.org?


    (And, it's always a good idea to never use your real name when posting anything which could be used against you).

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So you agree that damage can be done even if a person has possession in his mind of what he initially wrote?

      Delete
    2. Nope. If you say something in public, you have to assume that public will remember it. Writing stuff down on paper or in electrons doesn't change this basic fact. Remembering is a basis of consciousness, and thus is an unalienable right. There cannot be such thing as "right to be forgotten" - and thus no right to demand from others to erase whatever information they learned.

      Once you understand that there is no strict boundary between mental states and material records (and that a mental state is an electrochemical record) you'd see the insanity of IP laws which somehow permit unrestricted copying into mental states but prohibit the same for the artificial aids to the same. (And even this boundary blurs even further as advances in neuroscience make mental states directly accessible, and as advances in AI make computer states more and more like mental states in their nature - is a "work of art" produced by a neural network after it was trained by seeing "works of art" by some third parties derived and not? If yes, why exactly the same process done by humans isn't? If not, what exactly level of sophistication of the neural network is sufficient to differentiate it from a simpler "mechanical" transformation?)

      BTW, I do have experience of being a witness in a lawsuit where plaintiff alleged mental contamination of anyone who saw a source code of a software system - so that the person won't be able to write an original piece of similar code ever again (and that whatever his employer had him to develop is infringing on "Intellectual Property" of the plaintiff). That particular lawsuit had a major impact on the software industry - and is the direct reason why we have Linux, and not a saner operating system, as the most common OS.

      What you do not understand is that the entire high-tech industry is alive only because of wide-spread willful disregard of the "IP" laws. Everybody pretends to respect them - and everybody grossly violates them. Trying to enforce them even half-assedly will immediately kill every high-tech company on the planet. All of this "IP" regime is nothing more than on-going extortion by legal profession preying on the productive people.

      And, no, there is no "libertarian" way to fix it using the contract law as substitute to the government-granted monopoly privilege. Contracts require logical consistency, and there's none to be seen in the notion of "IP" itself.

      Delete
  2. So are you arguing that you did not have the right to use his property?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was told incorrectly IN WRITING that posting was approved. As I have said countless times, if someone receives something under false claims, you simply stop publishing, printing, etc.

      In the same way as you would give up a car if you bought it from someone who stole it. This is not complicated.

      Delete
    2. Robert,

      You are arguing from conventional manners. You took it down to be nice. How does this relate to IP?

      Delete
    3. This is the state I am referring to: "The anti-IP crowd would say that because you know what you already wrote you couldn't possibly be harmed :"

      Delete
    4. Might be helpful to clear the permission detail up in OP, since the sender said he was unaware it would be published.

      Delete
    5. @JimAugust 1, 2016 at 9:56 PM

      The anti-IP crowd argues there is no problem (loss, damage etc.) if the creator of the matter still has it in his head. But the creator certainly saw the potential for damage if his name and email address stayed in the post.

      The point being that the creator can still experience damage from "something being out there," even if he still has the material in his head.

      Delete
  3. Who in particular is making that specific argument?

    Your example of damage is nothing more than an nonproperty externality, which lurk in all actions (folks -- observers -- hold opinions of each of us based on their view of our actions). However, those externalities do not create forms of property. And none of this has anything to do with IP.

    BTW: Even though you redacted names and other identifiable information from your post, those names continue to exist in website caches and the minds of those who read it before redaction. Are those folks committing some sort of property crime? Can they be forced to redact from their memories? It seems you are arguing yes.

    ReplyDelete
  4. This argument is silly. I doubt IP law requires someone to remove web content written and posted voluntarily by an author when requested. It sounds like you want to expand existing IP law to draconion levels. How would such a rule be implemented? Would there be a new standard support email, such as ipclean@nytimes.com (etc) you would send the request to? On what basis would the request be fulfilled? Would the email of the blog post need to match the email of the post?

    When discussing economics, you will argue about trade offs and unintended consequences. Doesn't that apply here? What is the harm in leaving a post written voluntarily by the author? Can't the author simply state "my views have changed, blah, blah".

    The internet is the greatest invention in history and at the moment remains relatively free. It is this freedom that, in my opinion, is going to very quickly change the world. Those of us who live our lives outside the world of blood-sucking politicians now have this tool in our hands that allows us to expose the lies of governments and to see that citizens of other countries are (generally) no different than we are.

    ReplyDelete
  5. On the case at hand, it is hard to imagine any “anti-IP crowd” type or other type asserting what one has said, written or done cannot cause loss or damage. What you've done, wrote or said, of course, can cause loss or damage.

    Hell, you can experience loss or damage revealing your religion or lack thereof or what you've read or what events you attended or people with whom you've associated & certainly many more things both revealing something of yourself along with things no right mind could construe as any evidence of your position on anything at all.

    All this case shows is that Wenzel is a decent sort unless he is telling us his aid in this case was ONLY because of his IP stance & were he to develop an anti-IP stance he'll tell the next man FU, I don't believe in IP rights anymore.

    ReplyDelete