On Fri, Feb 24, 2012 at 9:10 PM, Eric Walker <eric.wal...@gmail.com> wrote: > > I personally think the patent system is fatally flawed, and I haven't the > slightest sympathy for the idea of "intellectual property." >
The conversation has moved on, but I should moderate the statement above, a little. I can think of some situations in which an injustice would be done to an inventor. An example is an inventor who puts a lot of his or her own personal time and money into an invention and in the process discovers a breakthrough, and then a better prepared competitor comes along and implements the idea without having to have put up the initial costs. So I disagree with my earlier statement that IP law is inherently illegitimate. But I'm often struck by defenses of it that go beyond "let's not do anything rash." Creativity primarily involves putting a new spin on ideas that other people came up with. Eric
