Copying is Creativity, Everything is a Remix.

[Anonymous]

http://www.everythingisaremix.info/

In the end, all of our thinking is based on previous learnings. Our ability to stumble upon further knowledge is based on man's previous discoveries. That is not to say we are forever indebted to our forefathers but that information, these ideas are part of a gradual collaborative process. One can never claim a technique, form or function as truly and solely their own, even though their additional labor, having created a more functional variation. This labor may have value but it is not scarce. Every man can push a rock as he can innovate.

Innovation shall not be artificially limited to a few but inherently available to all. As organisms copy their fellow species in feeding themselves, we shall copy how others build and create.

To label this as a immoral is to degrade all life to criminals and thieves.

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[NghtRppr]

Did you invent the words you are using to think and speak with? No?! Theft of intellectual property!

[myrkul]

This probably explains why mashups are some of my favorite songs.

[Tawsix]

See how many pharmaceutical companies invest millions of dollars into R&D so that their competitors can make the drugs for only the cost analysis and production.

[myrkul]

"First to Market advantage" Charge monopoly prices while you can!

[Tawsix]

"First to Market advantage" Charge monopoly prices while you can!

That can't possibly be what you rely to discount that point... please tell me it isn't.

[myrkul]

"First to Market advantage" Charge monopoly prices while you can!

That can't possibly be what you rely to discount that point... please tell me it isn't.

It's shockingly oversimplified, but yes, that's exactly what I'm refuting that point with.

Company A makes new wonder-drug. Everybody wants new wonder-drug. Company A can charge whatever they want for it. Company B also wants to make new wonder-drug and sell it to the pubic. They buy new wonder-drug (at the monopoly price, helping A recoup some of its investment), and research the formula. Once they've got it, they put their copy out on the market, just under the monopoly price. Company A undercuts company B, and so on, back and forth until it hits the Market value. The curve will look very steep at first (at the point B gets into business) and level off as B trys to ensure they recoup their investment, too, eventually reaching a point just over production cost.

[Tawsix]

"First to Market advantage" Charge monopoly prices while you can!

That can't possibly be what you rely to discount that point... please tell me it isn't.

It's shockingly oversimplified, but yes, that's exactly what I'm refuting that point with.

Company A makes new wonder-drug. Everybody wants new wonder-drug. Company A can charge whatever they want for it. Company B also wants to make new wonder-drug and sell it to the pubic. They buy new wonder-drug (at the monopoly price, helping A recoup some of its investment), and research the formula. Once they've got it, they put their copy out on the market, just under the monopoly price. Company A undercuts company B, and so on, back and forth until it hits the Market value. The curve will look very steep at first (at the point B gets into business) and level off as B trys to ensure they recoup their investment, too, eventually reaching a point just over production cost.

So who would buy this wonder-drug except other pharmaceutical companies, the very rich and impatient, or the very desperate, when you could wait until it came down to market price?

[myrkul]

So who would buy this wonder-drug except other pharmaceutical companies, the very rich and impatient, or the very desperate, when you could wait until it came down to market price?

The situation you describe is exactly the same now, except the monopoly lasts longer. So, same people who buy brand-name drugs now.

[LokeRundt]

Even with generic brands, the original name-brand still generally maintains about 30% of the market, even at their inflated prices.

[V4Vendettas]

It’s funny how architect's (In the UK at least) play with each other’s ideas and concepts all the time and everyone is cool with it.
Having a little background in this (2 years down one to go) it been said again and again by my tutors "there is no new architecture" .

LOlz so yea basically a remix.   Kind of annoying when every time you make something you thinks totally new one of them comes by "hey that’s just like Calatrava's so and so building, good work" you feel like tearing your hair out.

Just you wait tutors when we get architects in zero g then we are gona see some truly new stuff.

[ribuck]

Furniture is designed by remix. Recipes are designed by remix. Clothing is designed by remix. Interior decoration is designed by remix. Folk dances are still designed by remix. Store layouts are designed by remix. Transport schedules are designed by remix. Book plots are designed by remix. Soap opera themes are designed by remix. Much of today's software is designed by remix. Most business models are designed by remix.

Human culture is based on copying with and without modification. Just because a few fields managed to get government-enforced monopolies (e.g. patents) doesn't mean that society wouldn't function without those monopolies.

[chickenado]

See how many pharmaceutical companies invest millions of dollars into R&D so that their competitors can make the drugs for only the cost analysis and production.

If you are going to use a utilitarian argument in favor of patents then at least  weigh up the benefits of patents with their detriments.  Don't just cherry-pick examples where they (may) be beneficial.

Even if patents are beneficial for some people in this particular case, they are still unethical. Slavery was beneficial for a lot of people too.  In fact, anti-abolitionists used to bring up utilitarian arguments similar to yours. "Nobody will be able to afford to pay for all this work", "it will ruin the economy", "slaves don't know how to take care of themselves", etc.

On a more practical level, if people really care about some drug being developed there are other models apart from patents to incentivize this.  One is a bounty system, where potential beneficiaries of the drug pay into a fund and whoever develops the drug first gets paid the prize.  The people who paid into the fund perhaps get the drug at a discount rate for a few months.  Yes, this creates more free riders but most economic activity already has a lot of free riders anyhow.

[MatthewLM]

"First to Market advantage"

People always miss out the time element with economic thinking. This is true.

But why do people think companies make allegiances when making new technologies? They can spread the cost over more beneficiaries and gain advantages from using resources from the different companies. They can develop it faster if the partners can create a good relationship etc.

And don't expect that every company can easily copy new products including any complex new manufacturing processes required. Then you have elements such as brand loyalty and repeat custom which enable the first company to create a new product to maintain customers unless another competitor actually does something better. You can't just copy someone and steal their customers, why would customers move unless you did it better? Often you will have to offer something clearly considerable better to offset the risk involved with changing supplier.

The location element is important too. If a business maks a revolutionary new product or business model but it's location tied, why shouldn't competitors copy and introduce it to other areas? Not just to geographical locations but also to different market segments.

Patents create much more damage than people think, I reckon. Patents are the worst form of IP rights.

[ribuck]

Yes, this creates more free riders but most economic activity already has a lot of free riders anyhow.

Free riders is not necessarily a bad thing in a free society. It's one of the ways that wealth gets non-violently redistributed to the needy.

As for developing drugs, there are plenty of possibilities. Research & Development can be funded by consortiums of hospitals, or by patients who have a potentially-treatable condition, or by philanthropists, or by investors who reckon they can make their money back from the first-mover advantage, etc.

[Agozyen]

 Every first person shooter game is derived from Wolfenstein 3D.  Imagine if id software had patented the concept and kept it to themselves. 

[ribuck]

Bitcoin is mostly a well-balanced remix of already-established concepts, with just a smidgeon of inspired original genius to make it work.

[myrkul]

Bitcoin is mostly a well-balanced remix of already-established concepts, with just a smidgeon of inspired original genius to make it work.

'If I have seen far...'

[Sannyasi]

what started this remix?... surely there was an original track to 'life'

[myrkul]

what started this remix?... surely there was an original track to 'life'

Yup, I believe it goes something like "Ommmmmm"