[om-list] Public Money, Private Code

[Gary Packer]

Thom and Mark,

Good to see you are thinking about things like this.  I wish I could implant
into your minds what I know about free enterprise.  The world is not black and
white as we would sometimes wish, but there are some basic truths that are true
most of the time.

1.  Government is inherently bad.
2.  the less government the better
3.  the more freedom to  entrepreneurs the better
4.  protection must be granted to the artist, inventor, scientist/researcher,
business man, etc.  If they feel they want to  release their product for public
use, that is all right but they need to know that their rights are protected in
order to encourage them to invest time, money, and effort into a project so that
it will return that investment and a profit
5.  profit is good
6.  government interference with business is bad

Unfortunately big business is usually corrupt and is almost as bad as big
government. I am afraid we will soon say good-bye to mom and pop farms, stores,
inventors, etc.  That is what made America great.  The left (communism and
socialism) is creeping right and democracy and republicanism is creeping left.
More than ever in the history of the world these opposing societies are
approaching.  People in our republic now think that they are parented by the
government.  It keeps getting bigger and bigger and taxes take a larger and
larger share of the profit.  It is a disincentive to the business man.  Our
nation has a lower and lower respect for business.  The wheels of commerce will
grind to a halt quickly and there will be no grease with which to lubricate it.
The nation is too large and too full of untrained individuals to return to an
agrarian society.  We are getting too big and the fall will be great. ( the
bigger they are... ) The only hope is to return freedom to the average person
and re-instill in him the righteous principles of honest business.  Sound
impossible?  Probably is.

Don't get me wrong.  I never advocate no government.  Just limited government.
We need a court and penal system to keep in check the thugs and murderers but
for the purpose of our freedom.  Our nation should be banned from international
entanglements except to protect our national interests.  Our military should be
defensive and not aggressive.  Schools should all be private.  There should be
no government entitlement programs and welfare.

That last part sounds hard but good people, allowed to make the free enterprise
system work, will take care of the poor and needy. Supply and demand will create
jobs for all willing to work and that same supply and demand will see to it that
wages and salaries are fair.   If you continually take away the profits of the
business man, businesses will fail and they will no longer exist to be taxed to
fund government programs.  Every dollar that is taxed for the purpose of
providing welfare programs does not deliver even a dime to the actual
recipient.  In other words if a business man gave a dime directly to the poor it
would have the same benefit as giving a dollar to the government to get the dime
to the poor. The education dollar is poorly managed as well.

Free enterprise is based on simple, but not widely understood principles.  One
of them is supply and demand and a basic accounting course will explain how that
works.  A sub principle is that competition will eventually bring the cost of
goods to its lowest price and best quality.  That is why breaking up monopolies
is a good thing.  Government makes monopolies not business.  Build a better
mouse-trap and the world will beat a path to your door.  The mousetrap builder
should be protected with his patent  and the writer with his copyright.  They
should be paid a profit or license fee.  Why should a Ben Oman be given the
right to use something for free unless it is freely given by the developer.
After a period of protection the information will enter the public domain.
Protect the businessman and allow him a profit and others will join him and
provide low cost quality competition.  Steel away a man's invention and he will
stop inventing and competing.

Look to your own computer industry.  When I was a boy there were no computers.
When I was in college a four function calculator was as big as a briefcase and
had to be plugged in to a receptacle and cost a weeks salary.  If the rights of
the computer industry were not protected you would not be able to buy a complete
computer for $900. now.  Protecting them created competition.  Competition drove
the price down and brought continual innovations.  You now have a palm pilot in
your hand that it took a five story building full of gear to equal in the
UNIVAC.  In fact your palm pilot has much more storage and computing power than
that computer.

I'm afraid if its my opinion you ask it is a cut and dried question/answer.
Protect the inventor and allow free enterprise.  Government should not be
involved in trying to stimulate business.  Business has and will invest money to
encourage education. The only time Government should be involved in grants and
research, etc. is for the national defense (that obviously includes some
Aerospace research).  If you want government to help stimulate  research and
development then it should not get involved except to become smaller and lower
taxes to allow free enterprise to work.

For what it is worth.

Gary







Tom and other Packers wrote:

> Mark
>
>     (In case my dad has time to get into one of our discussions, I'm
> actually sending him an email.  I'm not sure why I haven't in the past.  If
> he's too busy, then he doesn't need to comment.
>
>     But to get him up to speed, we're discussing the opposing philosophies
> in the computer/software world, which differ in their desire to make things
> proprietary.  One could be characterised as the traditional university
> mentality which wants to make all software free and modifiable and re-usable
> by anyone; the other could be called the traditional business mentality
> which wants to make all software proprietary, and *owned* and sellable or
> licensable by a small number of entities.  Most people I know, like Lee H,
> Mark B, Luke C, Cameron Matheson, and Ben Oman, etc., like open-source, the
> former philosophy which promotes a lot of valuable development by many
> people who are not worried about making money on what they produce.)
>
>     It takes me time to generate ideas on a new topic, but I'm starting to
> develop an opinion about this topic, specifically the Bayh-Dole act and
> government funded developments.
>
>     Point one:  The simple perspective, that any product produced from
> publicly-funded research should be open-sourced, would eliminate the SBIR
> (small business innovated research) grant program, which is a big program
> for helping small businesses get off the ground using grants from various
> government agencies.  I think SBIR is a good thing.  In fact, I'm thinking
> of making use of it some day.
>
>     Point two:  (Enlargement of point one):  There's a reason (a principle
> behind why) the government gives away money to help small businesses: (1) it
> helps the business (get started), (2) it helps the government (produce a new
> tax-paying entity), and (3) it helps the general population (who need or
> want the product of the new business -- it's the third phase of this
> three-phase SBIR grant, along with qualifications for the first two phases,
> that require the small business to somehow indicate a high potential for
> producing something marketable).  If the principle holds for the SBIR grant
> program, who's to say that it cannot hold for other public funding -- even
> *all* public funding?
>
>     Point three:  (point two extended to universities):  If universities can
> gain royalties from the research they foster, then we have just created a
> very real-world type of criterion/mechanism promoting the survival of good
> universities: those who produce good, marketable work will get more money,
> and will survive to propagate their species.  I would think that this could
> mean that a good university would be less tied to government and public
> money, less dependent on money that carries no wise decision-making power.
> I'm not saying markets are "wise", but there's a good chance that markets
> are more practical, or street-wise than the government, (especially in the
> case of the arts, and all the silly funding we've seen for trash and kitch
> and "modern art").
>
>     I think the government these days tends to support a disease which
> universities are already too widely infected with, and that is
> multiculturalism.  They support activities in the name of diversity, which
> is often contrary to the stability of conservatism and contrary to the
> healthy growth found in enterprises motivated by real improvement needs.
> So, if the government were willing to let universities act more like
> privately owned corporations, ... ?
>
>     So, I guess I'm saying that I sort of lean toward the spirit in
> Bayh-Dole.
>
>     I think there's a philosophy that says that, in a system where
> compensation is more directly tied to the products it supports, the system
> will be more healthy and coherent and integrated, over-all, and in the long
> run.  I think Mark was trying to apply this philosophy to his ISP business,
> so I imagine he will agree with this to some degree.
>
>     Comments?
>
>     Should I develop this idea more fully and submit it to one of these
> on-line discussions Mark has pointed us to?
>
> tomp
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Mark Butler" <butlerm at middle.net>
> To: "One Model List" <om-list at onemodel.org>
> Sent: Friday, 04 January, 2002 09:36
> Subject: [om-list] Public Money, Private Code
>
> The following article is a great summary of the current state of
> intellectual property treatment in universities:
>
> http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2002/01/04/university_open_source/index.ht
> ml?x
>
> Personally, I think the Bayh-Dole act was a mistake. Publicly funded
> research should be released into the public domain.
>
> - Mark
>
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