Quote from: bitcoin2cash on May 04, 2011, 11:00:05 PM

Quote from: joeydangerous on May 04, 2011, 08:40:19 AM

Bitcoin2cash, well said in the first post. I do artwork as my trade and understanding why IP isn't property was hard for me to accept for a long time, but I think if you want to be free, you have to give up that one rule you think benefits you. Though now I realize it doesn't benefit me to have a violent gang "protecting" my IP. They only really protect the big corporate interests.

I went through the same thing. I'm a software developer by trade. Piracy hurts my bottom line since I'm selling my software directly to customers. I went into the debate trying reconcile my desire for intellectual property laws with my views on Libertarianism but I couldn't do it while remaining consistent. C'est la vie.

Same here...I was always (initially by default) not entirely opposed to IP, especially since I had worked as a musician/programmer/engineer/teacher/researcher (all industries that currently rely on IP), until I actually worked at an unnamed computer engineering corporation where I was exposed to the reality of the patent system (since I had to review all the gory details of a bunch of patents related to my work), at which point I started to question the whole concept. Naturally I searched google to help understand, and it really only took a couple pages of reading Against Intellectual Property (pdf: mises.org/books/against.pdf which is an argument based primarily on libertarian ethics) and Against Intellectual Monopoly (pdf: micheleboldrin.com/research/aim/anew.all.pdf which is a utilitarian argument so you don't have to be a libertarian in order to follow) for me to become consistently anti-IP. On a side note, Stephan Kinsella's writings also exposed me to the whole Mises and Rothbardian tradition, which led me to fully-embrace anarcho-capitalism.