On 5/29/97 Tresy Kilbourne ended with:
<<SNIP>>
>In any
>event, my life experience has taught me to expect that nothing is all yin
>or all yang, so until I am presented with a thoroughly developed argument
>(such as Chomsky presents in his works), I view sweeping,
>one-size-fits-all theories with skepticism.

I would like you to apply this sensible approach to your earlier assertion that:

       "... I hasten to add that IP laws are coercive IN DEFENSE of free
       trade and society, which is a paradox, not a contradiction."

My own instinct is that intellectual property is no different than other
property. The individual who invents an idea, method or device does not do
so in isolation from the wealth of previous human experience and social
support systems. To seek to own an idea to the extent of claiming the sole
right to profit from it deprives the millions of rightful owners of that
legacy of their rights. We are all equal shareholders in the wealth of
human achievements which was almost entirely created created by our
ancestors.

The capacity to create and invent becomes less the result of individuals
each day (if it ever was) and more the product of social support systems
such as education and pre-existing technology. Even a simple writer relies
entirely on the technologies invented by long-dead ancestors, such as
language, the alphabet, dictionary, printing press, not to mention all
previous cultural heritage, without which the writer's output has no value
even if it could be conceived or expressed. In addition of course the
writer usually relies on all the other accumulated technologies which
provide food and shelter without which the writer's intellect would not
function at all.

In a capitalist society of course intellectual "property" makes great
sense, but my point is that it has no validity outside the context of a
society divided by class, it is not a natural law. That is to say
intellectual property stands or falls with the capitalist system. If
capitalism is unjust, so are intellectual property rights and if you defend
intellectual property rights you defend capitalism.

As an admirer of your thoughtful comments in this forum I would appreciate
some persuasive arguments in support of "intellectual property".

Bill Bartlett
Bracknell Tas.

"...to abolish property, the basis of all civilization! Yes, gentlemen, the
Commune intended to abolish that class property which makes the labor of
the many the wealth of the few. It aimed at the expropriation of the
expropriators. It wanted to make individual property a truth by
transforming the means of production, land and capital, now chiefly the
means of enslaving and exploiting labor, into mere instruments of free and
associated labor." Karl Marx, The Civil War in France