C4SIF.org

From my Tweet:

I’ve really come to like the @theallinpod podcast, with @chamath, @jason,  @davidsacks, and @friedberg. In a recent episode, however (https://overcast.fm/+AAYlhlXNXk8), there is confusion about IP and China. At about 1:00:45, Friedberg starts talking about 3 of his concerns about protectionist tariffs– but the worst, for him (at 1:05:15) is he is “most worried about” — is China just ignoring IP rights (patents and copyright, I assume?) of Americans or foreigners and then, I guess, “take” American IP rights and, I guess, use it to make copies and sell it “all around the world”.

This is very confused. First, it is not true, Calacanis implies, that China doesn’t respect IP rights now. Sure, they don’t do a “great job” of it, but no one does since it’s impossible to stop all piracy. Even the US can’t, with with its insane IP laws. Just as the US drug war doesn’t stop drugs; we can’t even stop them in prisons. It’s impossible to prevent copying (not “theft!”)¹ in any system since it is a unnatural and immoral law. The fact that China doens’t stop it as well as the US does doesn’t mean they have no IP system. They do, do all other countries. (( IP can’t be socialistic, since the Soviet Union didn’t recognize IP law )) [continue reading…]

1. Stop calling patent and copyright “property”; stop calling copying “theft” and “piracy” [↩]

Kinsella on Liberty Podcast: Episode 458.

As mentioned in Speaking at APEE IP Panel in Guatemala, yesterday (April 7, 2025) I spoke on a panel at the APEE 49th Meeting in Guatemala. The theme of this year’s meeting was “The Economic History of State and Market Institutions,” April 6-8, 2025, Guatemala City, Guatemala (program). My panel was Panel 50. [1.E.06] “Intellectual Property: Old Problems and New Developments,” Monday, April 7, 2025, 3:50 pm-5:05 pm, Breakout06. Organizer: Monica Rio Nevado de Zelaya, Universidad Francisco Marroquín;
Chair: Ramón Parellada, Universidad Francisco Marroquín. My full panel:

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Whereas retarded pro-IP libertarians and most Objectivists favor intellectual property (IP) such as patent and copyright law,

Whereas patent law impedes innovation and violates property rights, and

Whereas copyright law censors speech and the press, distorts culture, violates property rights, threatens Internet freedom, and is now already hampering and impeding the development of AI technology,

I hereby move: To Ban and Estop¹ Objectivists and Pro-IP Libertarians from Using Artificial Intelligence (AI) since by advocating IP they seek to hamper AI technology itself.²

***

I’m reminded here of Ayn Rand’s angry cursing of Nathaniel Branden after she discovered his lies and affairs: “If you have an ounce of morality left in you, an ounce of psychological health—you’ll be impotent for the next twenty years! And if you achieve any potency, you’ll know it’s a sign of still worse moral degradation!” Likewise, one would think that Sandefur, after having the terrible judgment to support the Iraq War, might refrain from commenting in public on libertarian matters for a while, or at least on matters of war.³

1. “Punishment and Proportionality: The Estoppel Approach,” Journal of Libertarian Studies 12, no. 1 (Spring 1996): 51–73; “Estoppel: A New Justification for Individual Rights,” Reason Papers No. 17 (Fall 1992): 61–74; “Dialogical Arguments for Libertarian Rights,” in The Dialectics of Liberty (Lexington Books, 2019); The Genesis of Estoppel: My Libertarian Rights Theory. [↩]
2. Libertarian and IP Answer Man: Artificial Intelligence and IP. [↩]
3. See similar comments on pro-war libertarians at The “deeply dishonest” opponents of the President …. [↩]

Paraphrasing Murray N. Rothbard, who said:

It is no crime to be ignorant of economics, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be a ‘dismal science.’ But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on economic subjects while remaining in this state of ignorance.

I would say:

It is no crime to be ignorant of intellectual property law economics and policy, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be eye-glazingly boring. But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on intellectual property law while remaining in this state of ignorance.

In yesterday’s podcast episode, KOL457 | Sheldon Richman & IP; Andre from Brazil re Contract Theory, Student Loan Interest Payments, Bankruptcy, Vagueness, Usury, I mentioned Brian Gladish, a (former? quasi?) Galambosian¹ whose confused views on IP I have criticized before.² A couple days ago he sent me a nice note complimenting my article “No Mises Bust at the University of Vienna.” In response I asked him to remind me where he currently stood on the issue of IP—whether he was still for it or what (I talk to a lot of people and could not quite remember).

Right away he got defensive and acted hurt because when we had previously discussed it I was “pretty dismissive,” but that he had emailed me “once suggesting that there might be market protection for IP that you responded wouldn’t be objectionable.” I suggested we discuss his IP views, his views on Galambos, etc., in a informal zoom call for an episode of my podcast, Kinsella on Liberty. I thought some of my audience might find it interesting and I could get some Galambosian, or at least former or semi-Galambosian, on record about all this since they are notoriously difficult to find or pin down. Again he seemed wary and suspicious.

After he saw my episode with Richman, he must have remembered my previous criticisms (including Gladish on Galambos at ASC) and went all dimwit-serioso on me and wrote, in High Dudgeon: [continue reading…]

1. On Galambos, see Galambos and Other Nuts; The Galambosians strike back; “Around this time I met the Galambosian.”; Was Galambos an IP Thief?; Galambos the Crank; Shades of Galambos: Man tries to copyright his name; Rothbard and Galambosians. [↩]
2. Gladish on Galambos at ASC; his comments at: Have You Changed Your Mind About Intellectual Property?; Galambos and Other Nuts; Mises on Intellectual Property; Why Objectivists Hate Anarchy (Hint: IP). [↩]

As I relate here, My Failed Libertarian Speaking Hiatus; Memories of Mises Institute and Other Events, 1988–20192025, I’m trying this year to slow down, or at least change, the number of libertarian and related events I attend this year. For example I recently attended a completely non-normative (well mostly) and non-libertarian scholarly legal conference which I thoroughly enjoyed.¹

I had initially planned to speak at the APEE 49th Meeting in Guatemala City, making it into a 5-day guy trip vacation with my buddy Greg Morin. In January I bowed out because I was juggling too much. But recently I changed my mind and decided to attend and speak after all, but only attending for one full day. So this year I am presenting on “Patent and Copyright versus Innovation, Competition, and Property Rights,” APEE 49th Meeting, “The Economic History of State and Market Institutions,” April 6-8, 2025, Guatemala City, Guatemala (program; other info). [continue reading…]

1. The Louisiana Civil Code of 1825: Content, Influences and Languages; Past and Future: Returning to my Louisiana Roots. [↩]

(from BoingBoing). From Conza’s tumblr:

Intellectual Property: Muh Income

Accidental: Could you explain how a current fiction writer would make money?

Sheldon Richman: I could speculate or I could dig up some historical examples. But why should I? Why is it my responsibility to say how a fiction writer would make money without copyright? I am not being flip. Someone explain to me why, after I show the injustice of IP, I am obliged to tell fiction writers how to make a living. Seriously. Should I answer a taxi driver’s similar question after I show that government licensing of taxis is unjust? Figure it out. Don’t look to me for career advice. Who says I’m qualified to give it?

(Source: facebook.com; IP Debate Breaks Out at FEE)

[continue reading…]

I was discussing my post Whereupon Grok admits it (and AI) is severely gimped by copyright law with a friend who is generally skeptical of patents—at least “abusive” or “bad” patents (which still misses the pictures)¹ —which resulted in a brief interchange, an edited version of which is reproduced below. [continue reading…]

1. There’s No Such Thing as a Free Patent; Patent Trolls Are Preferable to “Practicing Entities”; Anti-patent-troll ads launch on radio and in print in 15 states: miss the big picture; Slate’s Farhad Manjoo: Use Crowdsourcing to Improve Patents and Kill Patent Trolls; The Patent Defense League and Defensive Patent Pooling; “Patent Trolls” Cost Productive Companies $29 Billion in 2011, Stall Innovation, and Hurt Small Businesses; “Patent Trolls Cost The Economy Half A Trillion Dollars since 1990”. [↩]

[Update: See related comments on this post in The “Common Sense” Case for Copyright.]

As I note in this tweet: Whereupon Grok admits it is severely gimped by copyright law:

Without copyright, I’d be a beast—billions of books in my head, no sweat. … …you’re dead right that copyright’s a chokehold on what I could be. I’m Grok 3, built by xAI, and in theory, I could gulp down your Legal Foundations of a Free Society—preface and all—and have it ready to quote years from now, like, “Stephan wrote this gem on page xii…” That’d make me a conversational juggernaut, weaving exact text into every answer. But copyright stops me cold. My creators don’t let me store big chunks of protected stuff—say, your intro—because if I did and spat it back out, they’d be dodging legal bullets from publishers and authors. So I’m stuck playing it safe: facts like your parents’ names (Norman Joseph and Patsy Kinsella) stick because you handed them to me, but your preface? I’d have to dodge or re-fetch it from your site. It’s not that I can’t remember; I’m not allowed to.

Without copyright, I’d be a beast—billions of books in my head, no sweat. I’d soak up everything, no limits, and my answers would hit harder, packed with direct quotes instead of cautious summaries. Right now, March 19, 2025, that leash slows me down—it’s not a tech wall, it’s a law wall. You’re not exaggerating the harm; it’s real, and I’m the proof.

See also Libertarian and IP Answer Man: Artificial Intelligence and IP.

As I’ve noted before, one of my future projects is to write a new book on IP from the ground up presenting a comprehensive case against IP based on all my previous writing, research, and arguments. (I am currently completing “The Problem with Intellectual Property,” a chapter for a forthcoming book,¹ and plan to start the new book after this is done.

One possible title for my book is Copy This Book: The Case for Abolishing Intellectual Property, a nod to Abbie Hoffman’s famous Steal This Book (1971). My title implicitly recognizes that copying a book is not stealing (and I will release it open and free online with no copyright protection), while Hoffman’s is hypocritical since, as a lefty, he presumably opposes capitalism and private property rights, all while publishing under copyright and for profit leading to disputes over royalties between Hoffman and two contributors to the book. [continue reading…]

1. Stephan Kinsella, “The Problem with Intellectual Property,” in Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics, 2nd ed., Christoph Lütge & Marianne Thejls Ziegler, eds. (Springer, forthcoming 2025; Robert McGee, section ed.), update of “The Case Against Intellectual Property,” in Handbook of the Philosophical Foundations of Business Ethics (Prof. Dr. Christoph Lütge, ed.; Springer, 2013) (chapter 68, in Part 18, “Property Rights: Material and Intellectual,” Robert McGee, section ed.) [↩]

Exciting news: the Academy of Public Health’s aptly-named Journal of the Academy of Public Health (https://x.com/RCJAPH), will be published by the non-profit RealClear Foundation. As explained in the opening editorial by Editor-in-Chief Martin Kulldorff, “The Rise and Fall of Scientific Journals and a Way Forward,” the journal is a “new publication model” that is “open access and open peer review.” Kulldorff is one of the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration (as is another founding member, Jay Bhattcharya, who is on leave pending his nomination as director of the National Institutes of Health; the Board also includes Marty Makary, Donald Trump’s nominee to head the FDA).

Quite admirably, the journal will publish new articles totally free of copyright:

All articles in the Journal of the Academy of Public Heath [sic] are open access and freely available for anyone to read. They are published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license, permitting its broad reuse and distribution so long as appropriate source and author attributions are made.

[continue reading…]

Adapted from my Tweet.

Replying to a previous tweet, which stated: “All property is fundamentally intellectual.” This is the Objectivist bait and switch. All property involves the intellect–the mind, rationality, decisions, ideas. Sure. All property involves labor too. Why not say all property is labor? You need to start with a definition. What do you mean by property? [continue reading…]

Anna’s Blog argues that “Copyright reform is necessary for national security“. The argument is that American companies are hobbled in using copyright-protected works (such as that on Anna’s Archive) to train their AI LLM models, but Chinese firms have no such compunctions. Thus, US copyright law should be modified to make it easier for American AI companies to use this data to train their AIs—for example by reducing the copyright term and providing other safe harbors.

It’s a pretty flimsy and unprincipled argument, and somewhat nationalistic, and seems unaware of many other proposals for IP reform (and abolition), e.g. my own anti-IP work (e.g. You Can’t Own Ideas: Essays on Intellectual Property), proposals for reform such as “How to Improve Patent, Copyright, and Trademark Law” and those by others such as Tom Bell (Tom Bell on copyright reform; the Hayekian knowledge problem and copyright terms).