SOPA and Three Ways to Think about Intellectual Property

The controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the United States and the attempts to shut down the peer-to-peer music-sharing website Pirate Bay in Europe have brought the debate over intellectual property to the fore. Professor Stephen Davies explains the three different ways people tend to understand intellectual property. Intellectual property:
– May be considered a natural right with the same qualities as physical property.
– May be considered a special type of property created by governments that is time limited.
– May be considered intellectually incoherent and dangerous.
Professor Davies holds the third view of intellectual property. He argues that it is dangerous because it limits the way people are able to use their physical property. He suggests that patents and copyrights may actually work to stop or hinder innovation in many areas. Whichever view you hold, the debate is complicated and divides people from all parts of the political spectrum. The argument over intellectual property has widespread implications, and we are going to see a lot more of it in the years to come.
For More on SOPA, see:
1. Washington versus the Web [article]: A feature in Huffington Post on the history and substance of the Stop Online Piracy Act
2. SOPA, the NDAA, and Patent-Trolling: Why Americans Need a Civil Liberties Caucus [article]: This Forbes article frames SOPA as just one in a laundry list of attacks on American civil liberties
3. SOPA Explained: What It Is and Why It Matters [article]: This CNNmoney article neatly lays out the details of SOPA and discusses its significance
For more on Intellectual Property, see:
1. Case Aganst Intellectual Property (video): An argument for how the very idea of Intellectual Property stifles innovation and violates freedoms
2. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, Discusses Intellectual Property (video): A discussion on the tensions created between producers and consumers of content by intellectual property law
3. Napsternomics: What’s the Most Effective Way to Protect Intellectual Property? [article]: Economist Russ Roberts explores the possibility that the best way to protect intellectual property is without intellectual property law
4. “Intellectual Property” [encyclopedia entry]: This entry in the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics covers copyright and patent law
SOPA and Three Ways to Think about Intellectual Property
Until recently, if you started to talk about intellectual property, most people’s eyes would glaze over and they’d try rapidly to change the subject. Recently, however, here in the United States, we had the enormous controversy over SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act, which led to a mass movement of protest by people who feared that their own favorite websites would be shut down. Over in Europe. the attempts to shut down the peer-to-peer music-sharing site Pirate Bay led to the formation of a new political movement, the Pirate Party, which actually enjoyed considerable electoral success in both Sweden and Germany despite being a one-issue party.
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