Whatever is the defining idea of the next decade, it ought to be free. Come to think of it, the idea that ideas ought to be free could well be the defining idea of the next decade.
In some ways this is an old notion, but it has new urgency in our increasingly idea-driven world. Lifesaving drugs, performance-enhancing software, and genetically modified seeds are overpriced and hence underused because of the monopoly power conferred by intellectual-property law. Innovation is stifled when artists, inventors, and entrepreneurs are forbidden to riff on others' themes. Enforcement consumes vast resources. The FBI tracks illegal movie downloads. Shouldn't they focus on tracking terrorists?
The problem is to make ideas free while still rewarding their inventors. So far, the best solution comes from the Harvard economics professor Michael Kremer, who wants the government to go right on granting patents (or copyrights), but then to purchase those patents at a fair price and place them in the public domain.
The sticking point is determining the fair price. Kremer's idea is to put each patent up for auction. When the auction ends, a government agent shows up and flips a coin. If the coin lands heads, the auction bidder buys the patent; if it lands tails, the government buys the patent for the amount of the winning bid. That way, half of all patents end up in the public domain, and the government never pays more than some private bidder is willing to offer.
Or better yet, the government agent can flip a weighted coin that lands tails 90 percent of the time. You just have to let the private bidders win often enough so that it's worth their while to show up and bid sensibly.
There are a thousand questions about how to prevent collusion and other sorts of price manipulation. Kremer has answers. Those details matter, but what matters most is this: The Kremer plan would cost us a bundle as taxpayers, but, by eliminating monopoly power, would save us a far bigger bundle as consumers. I know this because once an invention enters the public domain, it gets used more widely and generates more wealth.
That wealth has to go somewhere. It doesn't go to inventors, who receive only a fair-market price for their patents. So it has to end up in the hands of consumers. When the pie gets bigger, someone has to get a bigger piece.
The Kremer plan would release a torrent of technological innovation sufficient to enrich everyone who uses patentable products, which is to say everyone. An idea this good can't be ignored forever, and if it, or something like it, becomes the defining idea of the next decade, then the defining ideas of all future decades will have much richer soil in which to grow.
Comments
1. arrive2__net - August 29, 2010 at 04:19 pm
In a sense that type system partially exists in that you can buy and sell patents and copyrights now, however the government doesn't normally buy a patent unless there's some kind of top secret military technology involved, in which case they keep it secret. Traditionally, patents are supposed to expire after so many years, and that is how devices and inventions get into the public domain now. So society doesn't pay for them, they just go into public domain after so long, usually 17 years I think. Even copyrights expire and the documents or images can go into public domain, although publication and entertainment industries can get Congress to manipulate and extend copyright expiration dates.
The government also has documents written or prepared for it, and these it owns and can freely distribute and/or declare public domain. "Ideas" can't actually be copyrighted, just the words, designs, and images are copyrighted. You could describe or even redefine an idea, provided it is in your own terms. Also, there are also all kinds of "fair use" exceptions to copyrights, especially for education or for satirical purposes.
The idea of redefining the price of an invention or creation without "monopolistic" power seems meaningless. The value has to be based on the unique qualities of the invention and an optimal way of selling it. If the government won the hypothetical coin flip, their optimum choice might be to sell it to the other high bidder, if that truly is the fair market value of the invention. The government and people would get their value by the sale price, but the effect would be nothing ... other than the costs of the sale. The inventor could bid a billion dollars for any invention, and if he or she wins, he or she pays his or herself, and keeps the invention. No big deal. On the other hand if the government wins, the inventor gets one billion dollars, not bad.
The orininator of the creation can also riff off it, and indeed has won the right to do so by virtue of his or her inventiveness. Also, the creator is likely to care about the creation, and want to take care of it. How would you like to create something new, have it seized and sold by the government, then watch your idea be placed on public domain where it can be spoiled and desecrated by uncaring profiteers, pornographers, etc ... who, since it is in public domain, have no specific interest in caring about it or maintaining its association with quality or value. Not much fun, I would say.
I have a problem with the fact that many farmers can't keep their own crops for seed because pollen from a patented seed crop has invaded their field ... that is an abuse of patent law in my opinion. However, overall intellectual property rights are critical.
Bernard Schuster
Arrive2.net
2. janeer1 - September 01, 2010 at 09:02 am
Hear, hear.
But the federal government has already paid for many science and technology patents--by funding the research, the labs in which they are developed, the training and salary of the persons filing the patents, the start-up of companies, etc. The government should own, and make this knowledge freely available, in the first instance, rather than pay again (as consumers must pay again after having paid as taxpayers).