[P2P-F] patents, why their time has gone

[Michel Bauwens]

http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2011/07/why-we-should---and-can---abolish-all-patents/index.htm

Dear chris, I wanted to excerpt from the above, but copy-paste doesn't work
here ...

can you publish the excerpt starting at (just under slide show)

Patents date back to the 15th century, when they were issued by the English
monarch as “letters patent” - “patent” because they were open for all to
see, rather than sealed. Despite their royal provenance, they were
essentially instruments of piracy: they were used to “steal” knowledge from
other lands by offering a 20-year monopoly in England to the person bringing
that knowledge into the country.

UNTIL

one-before-last paragraph above the nathan m. quote ...

thanks Chris!!


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