Comment by __MatrixMan__
7 hours ago
Since we're doing minor nitpicks...
Data can't be owned in the first place. We can debate the merits of copyright but it's not a property right.
I'm all for finding better ways to support authors. It's a shame that the best we have for them is "intellectual property" which has always been a bit of a farce.
Stallman tried to introduce the term "intellectual monopoly", which fits better, since they really are monopolies granted by the government for limited periods of time, intended to promote progress in science and the useful arts.
"Property" was chosen specifically as a bait and switch. It tries to get people to take a concept that has been understood for thousands of years for physical objects, and apply it to this novel century-or-two long experiment for encouraging the production of easily-copyable things.
> since they really are monopolies granted by the government
This is property.
There are multiple usages of the word.
One of them refers to tangible things, was first codified more than 5000 years ago, and is almost entirely uncontroversial.
The other was popular in 1700's France re: their system of privileges, and the people found it so onerous that they embarked on a campaign of executing nobility until it seemed like the concept was good and dead.
We can use the word however we like, it's just a word, but if we conduct ourselves as if they're the same sort of thing, which France was doing at that time, we're in for the same sort of pain.
So what I'm saying is that its a bad idea for us to let data be property.
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All, or at least most property rights are monopoly rights anyway. I have a monopoly right over my house, and my car, my bank balance. That's just what ownership means.
Those rights are very flimsy actually. The government can seize your house, your car, and your money anytime. Hardly a monopoly when a third party can break it at will.
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> Data can't be owned in the first place
Of course it can. Ownership is a social construct.
It’s more accurate to say data resists being controlled. But honestly, so do e.g. air and mineral rights and the “ownership” of catalytic converters in cars parked on the street.
We've built a lot of layers of social machinery on top of it, but looking at the behavior of animals, ownership predates humanity, let alone social convention. Coming at it from that direction, something can be private property only if it is defensible in principle. Physical objects meet this bar, but concepts and types do not.
> something can be private property only if it is defensible in principle. Physical objects meet this bar, but concepts and types do not
Why not? I sing song. You sing song. I beat you with stick because that’s my song. You stop singing song.
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There's multiple types of ownership.
There's legal title. And then there's possession.
AA clearly possesses this data. It's not incorrect for them to refer to it as "their" data, until and unless it is removed from their possession.
> It's not incorrect for them to refer to it as "their" data
Totally agree.
Yes, but it is a social contract governing things that can't be easily copied.
We desperately need better social contracts which help us deal with data-about-me and data-i-created, but neither of those align very well with property.
I own paper money that is pretty easy to copy and worth far more than the paper it's on...
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> but it is a social contract governing things that can't be easily copied
I think it’s fair to argue this makes data something that should not be able to be owned. But saying it can’t be owned is plain wrong.
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You don't distinguish between the data and the data source.
Plenty of data becomes stale almost immediately. Plenty of data sources can be owned, but they also tend to be people.
Property can and does refer to rights over both tangible and intangible assets. It simply refers to ownership. Trademarks, brand identity and trade secrets are property. Some kinds of license can be property, and bought or sold. Shares in companies, or bonds are property. You may not like it, but that's a separate question.
What's usually happening here is that property is being misinterpreted as meaning something like object, but it just refers to a right of ownership which can be of objects.
It seems like you're completely ignoring the privacy angle. If no one can own data how can privacy be a thing?
> Data can't be owned in the first place. We can debate the merits of copyright but it's not a property right.
This is factually incorrect. I don’t know if you’re unaware of the law or introducing your own beliefs about what it should be, but this is not how the law works.
* can't (?)
Edited, Thanks.