Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter (now X) and Square (now Block), sparked a weekend’s worth of debate around intellectual property, patents, and copyright, with a characteristically terse post declaring, “delete all IP law.”

X’s current owner Elon Musk quickly replied, “I agree.”

  • Ulrich
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    -22 days ago

    So much of what I do is restricted because someone else has 30 years left on what they patented.

    If they didn’t patent it, that technology never would have existed in the first place for you to steal from.

    I think the best solution would be a much shorter exclusionary period for patents.

    100% agreed on that account.

    In short: if your goal is pure profit, yeah removing IP probably hurts this a little

    “A little”? If there’s no IP you just pay a janitor or an employee a million bucks to send you all the information and documentation and you manufacture the product yourself and undercut the company actually engineering the product so they can never be profitable.

    Like, this all seems very obvious to me…

      • Ulrich
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        12 days ago

        Oh gee, a rational contradiction supported with evidence.

    • snooggums
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      2 days ago

      People made stuff before patents existed. In many cases there were certain people and groups that were sought out because they simply did things better than others who made the same things.

      Knowing how someone else makes something doesn’t mean you can make it as well as the other person. Making quality goods is the same as cooking meals, the people and techniques are far more important than the designs.

      • @Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world
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        32 days ago

        That was fine before mass production made perfect copies possible on an industrial scale.

        You don’t need the person when you can copy the object and produce it at volume and scale because you already own the factories.

        • snooggums
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          02 days ago

          Mass production copies are far from perfect. Like the dollar store version of anything is shit tier even if it looks the same. I’m not talking snobby high end or anything, just well made vs trash tier.

          Hell, most of the goods we buy are made by a factory contracted with the person who designed and distributes the materials. That was true before we moved manufacturing overseas too. Cars were one of the few factories that were owned and operated by the companies that design and distribute the goods.

      • Ulrich
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        2 days ago

        People made stuff before patents existed.

        People also didn’t make stuff before patents existed. That’s why they exist.

        Knowing how someone else makes something doesn’t mean you can make it as well as the other person.

        Not necessarily, but often you can. You also don’t have to, you just have to make it cheaper, which you can because you are benefitting from someone else’s investment.

        • snooggums
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          2 days ago

          People also didn’t make stuff before patents existed. That’s why they exist.

          What didn’t they make?

          Not necessarily, but often you can. You also don’t have to, you just have to make it cheaper, which you can because you are benefitting from someone else’s investment.

          How many restaurants make fries? How many companies make a drink called cola? Are they all identical?

          Why do they keep making making those prodicts when they aren’t covered by patents?

          • Ulrich
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            02 days ago

            I don’t know. They didn’t make them.

            • snooggums
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              02 days ago

              So you are assuming they didn’t make them for reasons that didn’t exist at the time.

              Ok.

              • Ulrich
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                12 days ago

                No. I’m assuming that they didn’t make them based on simple and rational thought processes that I’ve already outlined several times.

                Does the fact that the richest billionaires in the world all want to get rid of them not concern you at all?

                • snooggums
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                  02 days ago

                  I assume that the way that Dorsey and Musk want to ‘get rid of them’ means for everyone else and will be terrible.

                  But that doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that before patents and copyright people made all kinds of things and had zero reason to not make something just because someone else cpuld too. That is a made up theory of yours that has no basis in reality.

                  • Ulrich
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                    2 days ago

                    I assume that the way that Dorsey and Musk want to ‘get rid of them’ means for everyone else and will be terrible.

                    What does that mean? Who is everyone else? You think they only want IP for themselves? No, they don’t want new companies to be able to innovate. Because then they could steal their ideas and apply their wealth to them to make a superior product. Thus no one would be able to compete with them. Pretty rational idea, don’t you think?

                    had zero reason to not make something just because someone else cpuld too steal their ideas they’ve invested millions of dollars to create and sell the same product at a lower price, thereby bankrupting the company that made the investment to bring that technology into existence.

                    FTFY. Please do not intentionally misrepresent my statements.