The concept of "intellectual property" is a novel myth circulated by the industries that benefit from it, and it always has been. There was a time before copyrights, and I personally think we are already living in a post-copyright age (and, for all their complaining, the major copyright industries seem to agree -- why else pursue things like DRM?). Some future generation is going to be scratching their heads trying to figure out why this current generation wasted so much time, effort, and money trying to stop everyone from using the most effective copying machines ever conceived of to make copies of things.
Have you heard of Sam Slater, the father of the American factory system? He's a hero in America for stealing IP from Britain, where he was known as "Slater the Traitor"
Have you heard of Louis Pasteur? He discovered Germ Theory in 1861. This man or his legacy is of course is not what we're talking about, which is why I bring it up. To change the subject.
