Who does the knowledge belong to?

[Stormsurger]

Hi guys,

I am currently in the process of preparing my TOK presentation (for those who don't know what I mean, it's part of the IB diploma's curriculum, basically Philosophy). Now for my Topic, I picked copyright laws on the internet and how they would impact on the knowledge we as a world have. Thus my question to you guys is:

Who do you think does an idea belong to? And for how long? Is there a limit to "knowledge ownership" / should there be?

Thanks in advance for your opinions!

 

[senordesol]

There's a distinct difference between 'knowledge' and an 'idea'. And while we're at it, we should also make sure we properly define 'belong' (this is a philosophy class, right?). To me 'belong' can mean an 'exclusive ownership' (e.g. classified material, not to be shared with anyone, anywhere, at any price) which belongs only to a set of defined persons. A 'dictatorial ownership' as I would define for a creative work wherein anyone can enjoy it, but only defined persons can profit from it decide where, when, and for what price it appears, etc. 'Contributory ownership' wherein anyone can contribute to the work, but only a few are accepted to actually be included. And 'democratic ownership' which whens, anyone, anywhere can contribute to the work to be enjoyed by anyone (like these forums...though the possibility of being banned edges the forums closer to contributory ownership).

In most of these cases we see that only a very few people actually 'own' the work. How long can they own it? Well, that depends. I believe an artistic work should only be 'owned' by its creator until the creator sells it (at which point someone else owns it) or dies (at which point it becomes public domain). In general, a single IP -I believe- should only have a total shelf-life of 50 years (or less) after being released for public consumption -sold or not- before it becomes public domain. Classified material should only remain so as long as provable damage to the owner's interests can still occur if the secret was outed (excluding criminal acts, of course).

 

[isometry]

I like the model of publicly funded science, where people get credit for their ideas and it helps with career advancement, but the ideas are documented so anyone can read them and contribute to the next step of the research. Most of the knowledge and research that matters from a philosophical point of view is disseminated this way, while copyrights and patents mostly apply to entertainment and ad hoc solutions to engineering problems, rather than to knowledge or ideas.