"I'm GGG and I approve this message."

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Would you explain it better/more? Though this was actually helpful.

To address Burger's broader question, IP is treated differently than other property because it is different. Most property obtains some portion of its value from its inherent scarcity, whether it's real estate, or gold, or whatever. Most creative property can be more easily replicated, whether it's the book or movie protected by copyright, the invention protected by patent, etc. (That's what I meant about Pfizer/Disney/MSFT/etc going bankrupt without IP laws, because otherwise everyone could replicate their property with some degree of ease.) That's why the Constitution and Congress give inventors a limited monopoly over their creations, such that for some period of time, they can slice and dice these ownership rights to maximize their returns from this property, and to further innovation by providing creative people with financial incentives to create more stuff in the future.

Beyond that fundamental question there are, of course, arguments about the length and breadth of that statutory monopoly. At some point, it's dumb to make the monopoly TOO strong because it overly rewards current IP owners and discourages future innovation. (See, e.g., the recent and retroactive extension of copyright protection to a duration of 95 years or so, which just happens to benefit Mickey Mouse but has little or nothing to do with the whole creating-incentives-to-future-innovators thing.)

Burger's narrower question, though, isn't really about one of these controversial elements (at least as measured by IP standards). It's always been a pretty typical technique to divide up and license IP rights by territory. (You can make and/or sell my patented invention in country X, but not in country Y.) That's what Big Pharma has done here, and the price discrepancy has to do, IIRC, with price controls in Canada. So Big Pharma is entirely right to say that Canadian distributors can't sell into the US, because most likely they didn't give those distributors the right to sell outside Canada in the first place. In most cases, this outcome makes sense because no one would otherwise care, but here, this outcome is political suicide because we're talking about pills which improve and/or save lives. You won't let me buy this pill from a Canadian pharmacy for $5 when I'd otherwise have to buy it for $50 in the US? Fuck you, Big Pharma.

In other news, insomnia blows chunks. Hard.

Gattigap

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Gattigap
To address Burger's broader question, IP is treated differently than other property because it is different. Most property obtains some portion of its value from its inherent scarcity, whether it's real estate, or gold, or whatever. Most creative property can be more easily replicated, whether it's the book or movie protected by copyright, the invention protected by patent, etc. (That's what I meant about Pfizer/Disney/MSFT/etc going bankrupt without IP laws, because otherwise everyone could replicate their property with some degree of ease.) That's why the Constitution and Congress give inventors a limited monopoly over their creations, such that for some period of time, they can slice and dice these ownership rights to maximize their returns from this property, and to further innovation by providing creative people with financial incentives to create more stuff in the future.

Beyond that fundamental question there are, of course, arguments about the length and breadth of that statutory monopoly. At some point, it's dumb to make the monopoly TOO strong because it overly rewards current IP owners and discourages future innovation. (See, e.g., the recent and retroactive extension of copyright protection to a duration of 95 years or so, which just happens to benefit Mickey Mouse but has little or nothing to do with the whole creating-incentives-to-future-innovators thing.)

Burger's narrower question, though, isn't really about one of these controversial elements (at least as measured by IP standards). It's always been a pretty typical technique to divide up and license IP rights by territory. (You can make and/or sell my patented invention in country X, but not in country Y.) That's what Big Pharma has done here, and the price discrepancy has to do, IIRC, with price controls in Canada. So Big Pharma is entirely right to say that Canadian distributors can't sell into the US, because most likely they didn't give those distributors the right to sell outside Canada in the first place. In most cases, this outcome makes sense because no one would otherwise care, but here, this outcome is political suicide because we're talking about pills which improve and/or save lives. You won't let me buy this pill from a Canadian pharmacy for $5 when I'd otherwise have to buy it for $50 in the US? Fuck you, Big Pharma.

In other news, insomnia blows chunks. Hard.

Gattigap

just so I'm getting to understand how fringey's brain misfires, what in the above didn't I saY?

it boils down to this: in general IP conveys the right to exclude others from making or selling stuff. most people think it gives you the right to make, but really it isn't that. a patent lets one stop others from making. a patent owner has that right unless he gives someone an exception.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Spanky
This guy makes Jerry Fallwell and Bob Jones look like saints. The filth he preaches is despicable and Osama aids and abets this filth by being a member of the organization, by being a donor (so his money can be used to help spread this filth) and calling this foul human being a close friend and mentor.

I couldn't really understand what all the yelling and gnashing of teeth were about, but I think this is the nub of it.

I've not bothered to read much of the details of Wright's stuff because I was inclined not to think it was a massively big deal what the dude's pastor thought, so perhaps I am simply horribly uninformed. But it's clear to me from this that you think he spends his sermons devouring live babies or something, and that "Osama" is just as culpable for being so goddamned stupid for attending this church, getting married and his family baptized here, the whole sha-bang.

I look forward to our future political chats. I am sure that they will continue to be educational and enlightening.

Love,
Gattigap

[Diane_Keaton]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
...leader who understands that there are people in this country who think that "God damn America" is more appropriate than "God bless America" than a leader that pretends that we're all hunky dory.

A few distinctions that matter to me, and some dems I know: First, we're not talking about people who believe "America isn't all hunk dory". We're talking about beliefs like "the U.S. is drugging blacks and killing them with AIDS". Second, the issue here isn't that Obama "understands" that people "believe" these things. Wright does more than "believe" this stuff - he is actively trying to PERSUADE and CONVINCE large members of the black community to believe the U.S. government is killing them with AIDS. Even though that makes Wright part of the problem, rather than a solution to racial strife, Obama saw a role for Wright in Obama's past and future which would include leading this country. It's not whether Wright is a relative -- it's that he isn't some eccentric guy mumbling conspiracy theories in a corner somewhere. Wright's got a huge audience and Obama knows full well Wright is trying to get masses of people to believe the government is trying to murder them. WTF.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Spanky
Obama should either state that this man is a pig, and his views are heinous and despicable, and quit his church, or he is not fit to serve as a postman let alone leader of the free world.

Spanky -- did you actually read the full text of Obama's speech?

(a) If not, you should not rant and rave about what he said or didn't say. If you did, I think you'll find Obama used very strong language to disavow and disagree with the comments you're talking about. For example, he called it a "deeply distorted world view."

This all may not be enough for you, as he did not actually spit on the man or personally insult him, but you should know it.

(b) You may not know this if you have not read the materials, but Trinity is not the Rev. Wright's church anymore -- he retired over a year ago. So, no need for Obama to quit that church right?

(c) They kicked Rev. Wright off the campaign a while ago.

S_A_M

P.S. But you know, these sorts of theories are apparently much morre prevalent in portions of black America than most whites would suspect. For example, do a Google search for Bill Cosby's theories on the origins of AIDS.

That stuff seems crazy to me, but things like the historical fact of the Tuskegee (?) experiments with syphyllis (which I know extended through the [etfix: 1950s] and I think into the 1960s) make it a little less so.

As Obama basically said -- it is too bad Wright could not move on from the past. That said, it not surprising to me that a black man in his 60's would be bitter, angry, and sometimes virulently critical of this country. I know we are all proud of how enlightened we are now, but it is a bit much to expect the Rev. Wright to share our views. He won't be singing Hosannas just because he's unlikely to get lynched any more.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
Wright's got a huge audience and Obama knows full well Wright is trying to get masses of people to believe the government is trying to murder them. WTF.

Where are you learning these things about this Wright fellow?

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
just so I'm getting to understand how fringey's brain misfires, what in the above didn't I saY?

Hank, the lay reader generally can't unpack into a multiparagraph explanation the powerful kick that is delivered by one or two sentences, carefully constructed and freed from their prisons of capitalization, punctuation and grammar.

Ty@50 and other historians of the future will confirm that, like most poets, your work was underappreciated in its time.

Gattigap

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
A few distinctions that matter to me, and some dems I know:

Yeah -- those distinctions do matter.

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
WTF?

You should at least give him a shout out for the passage in his speech which criticizes Wright's views as seeing "the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam."

S_A_M

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Hank, the lay reader generally can't unpack into a multiparagraph explanation the powerful kick that is delivered by one or two sentences, carefully constructed and freed from their prisons of capitalization, punctuation and grammar.

Ty@50 and other historians of the future will confirm that, like most poets, your work was underappreciated in its time.

Gattigap

Hank --

I'd say you used too much shorthand for a non-IP person to understand it. I got your meaning, but your answers assumed a lot of specialized knowledge -- in the absence of that knowledge, the response is "but why X" and then "but why Y."

S_A_M

[Adder]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Why should you get anything more than your contract rights? I have no quarrel with a contract as you describe, and proper remedies for its breach. But if I sell you a horse on the condition that you sell it only to a horse meat maker and not to sunny, my only remedy if you do sell to sunny is a contract suit. But if I sell you viagra and limit your sales to TM, but you sell to Sebby instead, why should I be able to sue for patent infringement?

You don't have a patent (a state granted monopoly) over the horse.

[Adder]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
i'm going to go ahead and call bullshit on you and atticus. BO could have said any number of thing about the minister, he could have said black people can't be racists in the same way white people are. Fuck. Running today I listened to Dead Prez's wolves. What the guy said wasn't that much out there.

But what he said was he can't write off the guy more than he could write off granny. if the guy was his other grandparent i see that.

What I don't see is how he isn't saying it's okay to have a racist minister is different than it's okay to have a racist friend.* do you think it's okay, or is it different? wait, factoid to help us work through this: Wonk- is there only 1 church in Chicago?


*in the middle of a speech that I thought was 90% great, but this one point, it bothers me, can one of you help me?

First, I have only heard a few clips of the minister on NPR yesterday, but I didn't hear him say anything racist. Certainly there are other statements out there, but I heard him go a little far in criticizing America and nothing more.

Second, this guy's church is pretty much wholly responsible for Obama's Christianity. He had no religion until he found it in this church. Does that factor in at all when you are evaluating whether Obama must be expected to walk away from the community because the preacher went a little far in his rhetoric once or twice in the last ten years?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Adder
You don't have a patent (a state granted monopoly) over the horse.

You and hank must have gone to the same school of pedagogy.

The question still stands--I own a horse or I own a patent. I sell the horse or I sell a patented product, perhaps pursuant to a distribution agreement. Why should the remedies for the resale of the patented product be greater than the remedies for resale of the horse if they violate that distribution agreement? (Bear in mind, I'm not asking "are they greater", which apparently they are, but rather "why should they be greater?")

[Adder]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Since you didn't answer my pointed question about why Bush is allowed to hang out with people who openly think all Jews and Catholics are condemned to Hell, and no one thinks to ask him about whether he believes this, I'll answer my own question -- because a large number of your people, combined with a small number of mine, have gradually caused all religious thought and speech to become privileged in this country. I mean privileged in the postmodern critical theory sense, not the legal sense -- it is entitled by its nature to be exempted and shielded from critical analysis. You're not supposed to think about it. You're supposed to feel it. And as to the religion of others, you're not supposed to talk about that.

So, yes, Hank, your relationship with your pastor is as sacrosanct as with your grandmother. Not because it really is, but because we made it so. Most Americans will disagree with you and agree with Obama, because they have become convinced that it's rude and hostile to call bullshit on anyone's religious beliefs and practices. You can do it on these boards because we're all members of the Cult of Reason, but I'll tell you now this is a losing argument for the rest of America. They don't want to be blamed for what their pastor says either. They don't want to have their religion criticized. Remember Mitt's speech?

L. Ron Hubbard was the greatest genius of the 20th century, because he saw this coming. He realized that if you could take a standard con man's business model and privilege it by calling it a religion, you could become untouchable. He did us a favor by making that religion as ridiculous as possible, testing the limits. He's laughing his ass off in Hell, or wherever Scientologists go. Because he was right.

Gradually, all thought will seek the protective label of "Religion." Once it achieves that label, it cannot be rooted out. You've got Equal Protection and Title VII saying that people can't judge you based on your thoughts. Think that 2+2=5? I can't do nutting fo ya, man. Believe that there is a secret invisible way that 2+2 can sometimes equal 5? I wouldn't dare fire you.

While you are right, if you would just add a little more condemnation, you would be bordering on Spanky here.

[Adder]

Originally posted by Spanky

You guys are lawyers, but you are like those stupid women following Charles Manson. Face the facts.

Hysterical much?

This guy’s organization isn't just a religion, it is a political organization. If Obama was a member of Jerry Fallwell's church, donated money to his organization and called Jerry a close friend, wouldn't it be safe to assume that he believes things similar to Jerry? Wouldn't it be fair to ask if he though abortion was killing babies, if homosexuals are an abomination and evolution is a myth? And if he didn't believe those things wouldn't it be fair to ask him why he was a member of Jerry Fallwell's organization, and why he donated money to it and called Jerry a close friend when he didn't believe anything Jerry said.

You do realize that these things (except the specific Falwell reference) are true for I'd guess about a third of American elected officials?

This guy makes Jerry Fallwell and Bob Jones look like saints. The filth he preaches is despicable and Osama aids and abets this filth by being a member of the organization,

Talk about a Freudian slip.

[Adder]

Originally posted by Spanky
Yes we also have racists, the KKK and a communist party. Those people hate American and we have to understand that.

Are you really this simple? Racists and the KKK hate America? That may be a convenient little explanation, but you can't really think that is literal truth, do you?