There is an implicit acceptance of the current copyright system and the laws regarding copyright as it stands, in your comment.
Look at the big picture, we have created a society that thrives on imposing artificial restrictions on everyone and the only people who benefit from it are big corporations.
By giving complete rights over the invention to the inventor or a corporation, we are limiting the potential impact of the invention.
Instead if access to such knowledge is made freely available, the possibilities are endless.
What if Sir Tim Berners-Lee patented the World Wide Web and monetized it?
To answer your last question: Civilization would have progressed faster, people would still be able to think and the economy would produce more things that are actually valuable.
Are you implying that the WWW is something noxious to civilization, thinking and economy and therefore it's failure (caused by being patented and monetized) would have been beneficial.
Or are you implying that if patented and monetized, the WWW would have been even more successful than it is and have a beneficial effect on civilization, thinking and economy.
If this isn't sarcasm I think either interpretation can be easily disproved.
There is an implicit acceptance of the current copyright system and the laws regarding copyright as it stands, in your comment.
Look at the big picture, we have created a society that thrives on imposing artificial restrictions on everyone and the only people who benefit from it are big corporations.
By giving complete rights over the invention to the inventor or a corporation, we are limiting the potential impact of the invention.
Instead if access to such knowledge is made freely available, the possibilities are endless.
What if Sir Tim Berners-Lee patented the World Wide Web and monetized it?