Kevin Carson, in America’s Peculiar Institution, on C4SS.org (referring to stories mentioned in Homeland Security Mission Creep: “Intellectual Property Crime”):
“Intellectual property” is enforced by special FBI task forces, one of them run out of Disney headquarters, closely coordinating their actions with the Motion Picture Association of America. Internet service providers are enlisted as junior G-men, spying on their customers on behalf of digital content “owners.” See if you can get that kind of zeal and diligence from the cops if mere tangible property like your car is stolen.
Well, actually there is a precedent: The authoritarian police apparatus that grew up around the task of reclaiming runaway “property” under the rules of that other peculiar institution, back in the 1850s.
Both peculiar institutions, yesterday and today, were on the wrong side of history. Human beings want to be free. Information wants to be free. All laws to the contrary will fail in the end.
Whereas slavery suspends all liberties from a few, copyright and patent suspend a few liberties from all.
Thanks, Stephan.
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