[PLUG-TALK] Re: [PLUG] Re: Open source drivers and patents (3)

[Jeme A Brelin]

On Wed, 15 Mar 2006, Keith Lofstrom wrote:
> The intentions of the writers of the Constitution were primarily to
> reward folks with temporary monopolies for publically disclosing trade
> secrets

But then Keith wrote:

> Patents are a license to sue and create economic havoc without being
> punished.  They are allegedly justified by the larger havoc that would
> occur if inventors were not paid - but unlike lawyers, inventors and
> others have many ways to make money besides lawsuits and extortion.
> Linux, and science, and many parts of the free market show that you
> can make plenty of money creating ideas without government-mandated
> monopolies.

Huh?!?

Patents aren't "justified by the larger havoc that would occur if 
inventors were not paid", but "to reward folks with temporary monopolies 
for publically disclosing trade secrets".

Patents appear to be a mechanism AGAINST the so-called free market's 
tendency to leave the public out in the cold and take secrets to the 
grave.

A patent system with a very short shelf-life seems to be the balance to 
strike if you insist on trying to balance liberty and capitalism.

And by the bye...

> Politics is not government, but a way to choose a government.

Not quite.  Politics is the mechanism by which folks interact in a civil 
society.  Physics for the physical; politics for the polity.

J.
-- 
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      Jeme A Brelin
     jeme at brelin.net
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