[pzh]

Stealing these results is a negative to society because it prevents the inventor from making profit on their inventions and from recovering their R&D costs. It is bad because it discourages companies from investing in R&D and from making advances in science and technology.

[claudiawerner]

This makes me question whether it is actually a negative to society, then; should we, as a society, rely on the incentive of profit to push technology forward, if this incentive is such a fickle thing? If it depends on keeping information secret? One of the favourite arguments of the liberals and capitalists is that the free market is efficient, but where is the efficiency in companies and individuals needing to re-create the same R&D over and over again?