This is the curse of IP – excessive restrictions upheld by laws used to protect the “economic rights” of authors. Instead of promoting scientific progress we are instead beholden to copyright. Instead of allowing human innovation to flourish, we are told ideas should be owned. IP reserves itself the monopoly of coercion. It does not exist to ease, facilitate and grant social innovation – it prevents such progress. IP is a hurdle to self-direction and thus the inclined labor of human beings. The solution is to question and dismantle this authority, furthering our progress towards a free society.

Feed 44:

• http://www.c4ss.org/
• http://www.youtube.com/user/c4ssvideos
• https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/c4ss-media/id872405202?mt=2
• http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/smash-walls-radio/c4ss-media?refid=stpr
• https://twitter.com/C4SSmedia

Bitcoin tips welcome:

• 1N1pF6fLKAGg4nH7XuqYQbKYXNxCnHBWLB

This is the very basis of the scientific method. We are encouraged to doubt and question the existing order, to follow self-direction and formulate our own hypotheses to work toward possible conclusions. In fact, an old academic motto notes that learners are not empty vessels waiting to be filled, but instead respond in different ways to the stream of knowledge and its current.

Under self-direction, peer-to-peer learning is incredibly important. Focusing specifically on Higher Education, particularly graduate academics, there is a need and reliance on empirical data. The goal of graduate research is to add to a body of knowledge that seeks understanding of a system or concept. In order to conduct such research, one must not only understand the relevant field, but also be granted access to data, information and the methods used to obtain such data. In today’s academic institutions this is championed, but there do exist barriers to achieving this goal — one of the greatest is perhaps Intellectual Property (IP).

Take the case of Diego Gomez, a 26-year-old Colombian student whose research interest is biodiversity conservation. Throughout his academic career, access to peer reviewed journals on global research databases was extremely limited due to lack of institutional resources. Because of this, Gomez became dependent on the Internet. The web allowed him to research, share documents and talk with colleagues. To further collaboration, when he and others came across relevant papers they shared them together over the net.

One such paper landed him in legal trouble when the author filed a lawsuit over the “violation of [his] economic and related rights.” Under the allegations of this lawsuit, reports EFF, Gomez could be sent to prison for up to eight years and face crippling monetary fines. His crime is violation of “intellectual property” law — patents, copyright and trademarks that restrict human labor and innovation.

This is the curse of IP — excessive restrictions upheld by laws used to protect the “economic rights” of authors. Instead of promoting scientific progress we are instead beholden to copyright. Instead of allowing human innovation to flourish, we are told ideas should be owned. IP reserves itself the monopoly of coercion. It does not exist to ease, facilitate and grant social innovation — it prevents such progress. IP is a hurdle to self-direction and thus the inclined labor of human beings. The solution is to question and dismantle this authority, furthering our progress towards a free society.

Luckily, we are well on our way in the age of network mutualism. Falling communication costs are allowing us to build anew within the shell of the old. The open access movement occurring on the Internet is creating global markets for free association among social networks that educate and inspire — totally void of traditional power structures. The creative, innovative potential for human labor in the Internet age is astounding.

In a free society ideas will not be owned. Ideas are powerful and fundamental to human flourishing — they should not be caged by legal activism. Instead, imagine a different order – one crafted by creative expression, innate interests and the ingenuity of a free society. To achieve greatness we must continue to advance today’s emerging, beautiful anarchic order. Open source content is fundamental to our success.

Le leggi sulla proprietà intellettuale comprendono i brevetti, i diritti d’autore e i marchi commerciali. Da qualche decennio ad oggi le imprese americane, soprattutto quelle ad alto contenuto tecnologico, hanno preso a dipendere sempre di più da queste leggi per proteggere i “loro profitti”: l’impresa prende il capitale mentre il lavoro individuale raramente riceve una ricompensa. Nota la Reuters, inoltre, che questo aumento delle cause legali è il prodotto di differenze tra le sentenze dei giudici costituzionali e le sentenze di una corte d’appello specializzata con sede a Washington che si occupa dei casi di brevetto a livello nazionale; su alcuni punti chiave le due parti non hanno raggiunto un accordo. Tenete conto del fatto che una sentenza sulla proprietà intellettuale può avere vaste conseguenze sulla società: il genoma umano e i vaccini dovrebbero essere brevettati o possono rimanere risorsa comune? Io propendo per quest’ultima. Ma l’industria farmaceutica investe molti soldi e molte energie politiche a favore di una forte protezione dei brevetti, così da poter proteggere il suo “diritto” multimilionario ad incassare una rendita su un monopolio inventato.

Se poi le cause legali che riguardano la PI sono aumentate è anche perché questa restringe l’ambito dell’attività umana e l’innovazione.

Le cause aumentano perché la libertà è la nuova etica: creative commons è qui per restare. La rivoluzione tecnologica generata dall’open source sta emergendo davanti ai nostri occhi con il suo tema della decentralizzazione, costringendo lo status quo a cambiare, e questo agli interessi particolari non piace. Per nostra fortuna il mondo è anarchico. La rivoluzione stigmergica lavora per vie traverse attorno alle gerarchie tradizionali e il loro potere di coercizione: il vecchio ordine (per quanto ci provi) non riesce a stare dietro.

Quello che vediamo è forza sociale in azione. In questa nuova pubblica piazza le corti, il potere legislativo e gli interessi particolari sono impotenti. Il mercato così liberato non è interessato alla proprietà delle idee, ma al progresso, all’innovazione e alla collaborazione nel lavoro. Il colonialismo corporativo ha i giorni contati.

Se si vuole liberare la società le idee non devono avere padroni. Una volta che queste finiscono nel mercato, chiunque dovrebbe essere libero di aggiungervi le proprie conoscenze e mandarne avanti la realizzazione pratica. Questo significa semplicemente massimizzare le capacità innovative dell’attività umana. Le migliori realizzazioni pratiche dovrebbero essere lasciate libere di svilupparsi. La PI, con le leggi che riconoscono la “proprietà” dell’informazione, restringe il potenziale creativo e innovativo della popolazione in senso ampio. Le leggi sulla PI servono a proteggere il capitale a spese dei lavoratori dotati di talento. Le idee sono uno strumento potente, fondamentale, in una società libera; e non dovrebbero essere ingabbiate dall’attivismo legalistico.

Grazie alle nuove tecnologie, oggi informazione e idee si diffondono senza restrizioni. L’attività umana ha un nuovo management: l’individuo. L’uso dei tribunali per privatizzare le idee e proibire il libero flusso delle informazioni è un credo che appartiene al passato; ecco perché è emerso creative commons. Il mercato va sempre alla ricerca della libertà, perché l’attività umana opera per l’avanzamento reciproco di tutte le parti della società.

L’attività umana dotata di talento, libera, è il motore che fa andare una società libera. L’ordine anarchico sta emergendo. Mentre seppelliamo la proprietà intellettuale reclamiamo il nostro potere sul bene comune.

Traduzione di Enrico Sanna.

“What we are seeing is social power at work. The courts, legislature and special interests are powerless in the new public arena. The liberated market is not interested in the ownership of ideas, but rather progress, innovation and co-operative labor. The days of corporate colonialism are numbered.”

IP law includes patents, copyright and trademarks. In recent decades U. S. businesses, especially those in the technology industry, have become increasingly dependent upon them to protect “their profits” — business gets the capital, individual labor is rarely rewarded. Reuters also reports that this rise in litigation is the product of differences between rulings by the justices and the findings of a specialized Washington-based appeals court, which handles the nation’s patent cases, because they have failed to reach consensus on some key issues. Keep in mind, rulings on IP can have wide-ranging consequences for society — should the human genome or vaccines be patented or remain common pool resources? I think the latter. The pharmaceutical industry, however, spends a lot of money and political energy on IP, favoring strong patents to protect its multi-million dollar “right” to collect rent on a manufactured monopoly.

Another reason for the sudden rise in IP litigation is because IP restricts human labor and innovation.

Litigation is up in the courts because liberty is the new ethic – the creative commons are here to stay. The open source, technological revolution emerging before our very eyes around the globe, with its theme of decentralization, is forcing a change of the status quo — and special interests don’t like it. Lucky for us, the world is anarchic. The stigmergic revolution works around traditional hierarchies and coercive power — the old order (try as it might) cannot keep up.

What we are seeing is social power at work. The courts, legislature and special interests are powerless in the new public arena. The liberated market is not interested in the ownership of ideas, but rather progress, innovation and co-operative labor. The days of corporate colonialism are numbered.

For a society to be liberated its ideas cannot be owned. Once in the market others should be free to add their knowledge to a concept and advance its practice. This does nothing but maximize the innovative capacity of human labor.  Best practices should be free to develop. IP restricts the creative, innovative potential of the populace as these laws allow the “ownership” of information. IP laws serve to protect capital at the expense of inclined labor. Ideas are powerful and fundamental to a free society — they should not be caged by legal activism.

Today, due to new tech, information and ideas are free to spread without restriction. Human labor is under new management — the individual now has agency. The use of courts to privatize ideas and prohibit the free flow of information is an aging creed — hence the rise of creative commons. The market always seeks liberation as human labor always works for the mutual advancement of society.

Inclined, liberated human labor is the engine behind free societies. The anarchic order is emerging. By leaving IP behind we are reclaiming our power in the commons.

Translations for this article:

• Italian, Proprietà Comune, Potere Comune.