[Natsu]

Too true. Everything on a computer can be represented as a number. So if you try to say that someone owns a number, let's say 5, how do you enforce that technologically? If they're not allowed to transmit 5, they can transmit 2+3 or 4+1. And it shouldn't take much imagination to see that to ban people from transmitting one number requires banning them from transmitting any numbers, because you can use any other number to make 5.

But mere impossibility isn't enough to make people give up. They'll keep trying and trying and just think that they didn't try hard enough, never wondering why people always seem to be able to find countermeasures. Maybe they can just ban the + program, any other use of it be damned? Oh, but we have - too. Well, there aren't that many functions on a pocket calculator, are there? Maybe you can ban them all? Maybe we could get that Godel guy to help us figure this out....

[arto]

Hence Cory Doctorow's recent talk, "The Coming War on General Purpose Computation":

http://boingboing.net/2011/12/27/the-coming-war-on-general-p...

[tweak2live]

War on General Purpose Computation == War on Consciousness. Why not just go straight to the root of the problem and outlaw certain kinds of cognitive patterns? Since "intellectual property" begins in the mind, so does "copyright infringement". Thought would be a whole lot easier to police, anyway.

Memory is theft. That's why I choose to stay ignorant - stupidity will never be outlawed.

[bo1024]

Great post/point.

I would love to see a lawyer in a courtroom ask the jury if people should be allowed to copyright or patent a number. Then show them a written numerical representation of the work in question (preferably compressed).