One could argue that patents and copyright are anti-capitalist
Comment on Insulin
minorkeys@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Capitalism is economic terrorism.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Malfeasant@lemmy.world 7 months ago
They are, actually. The point of patents and copyright is not to protect the creator- that’s a temporary effect. The point is to release the thing to the public afterwards. The problem is that capitalism corrupts the process and finds ways to make the temporary effects permanent. Disney has succeeded in making copyright last effectively forever.
Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 7 months ago
They are literally monopolies on whatever they concern.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Correct. Patents and copyrights are state granted monopolies that are in direct opposition to free market forces that capitalism thrives on.
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 7 months ago
Sure, everyone shoudl work for free except you, of course.
Patents only last 15 years. why isn’t the government making insulin.
cornishon@lemmygrad.ml 7 months ago
Free market? As in, competition between different enterprises? And what do you think happens when one company “wins” that competition? It will use that power to establish a monopoly (or a cartel with a couple buddy companies). Both “free market” and “private monopoly” are capitalist fenomena, just at different stages of development of industry.
Doomsider@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Copyrights and patents generate enormous amounts of wealth from rent seeking. This wealth has been used to continue to entrench these draconian concepts into our legal and governmental systems.
Even worse they have been used to stop the spread of information and monopolize development thus slowing slow down technological advancement. So many people have died so these clowns can make a buck.
One could argue that artificial scarcity is a farce, but unless you have more money than the people who benefit from IP, your voice will not be heard on a policy level.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 months ago
So, you agree patents and copyrights are contrary to capitalism and free markets?
Doomsider@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Personally, I think that if small business capitalism actually existed then it would run contrary to that.
There would be no need for copyright or patents. These systems create artificial scarcity which hinders society as a whole to benefit a minority.
I feel like our existing system of laissez-faire capitalism fully embraces the rent seeking found in intellectual property.
NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 7 months ago
In that case "real capitalism" doesn't exist, because patents have been a thing since checks notes 1474.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Anti free market policies can exist within a capitalist structure.
Historical existence of patents doesn’t destroy capitalism, nor make patents less anti capitalist.
NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 7 months ago
Okay here's the thing: Calling policies that contribute to monopolies anti-capitalist makes no sense, because by this standard capitalism is anti-capitalist. It's not like monopolies appear out of thin air; concentration of wealth into monopolies or oligopolies is the only possible equilibrium state under capitalism, so deflecting the effects of these monopolies as "anti-capitalist" is an appeal to fiction.
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world 7 months ago
And no capitalist would want to get rid of them.
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Sam Altman very much wants to get rid of copyright.
DeathsEmbrace@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Technically a funnel system for 1%.
quoll@lemmy.sdf.org 7 months ago
yeah. but more importantly your fucked up excuse for democracy is fucked.
plenty of capitalist countries that don’t have this problem.
minorkeys@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Which ones?
Woht24@lemmy.world 7 months ago
It’s almost like someone should go and shoot the CEO dead in the street
reksas@sopuli.xyz 7 months ago
ceos are like head slaves on plantation. While they are pieces of collaborating shits, they are not the root of this rot.
Woht24@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Yeah, thanks armchair historian.
reksas@sopuli.xyz 7 months ago
oh what am i saying, REVOLUTION NOW!