[MattPalmer1086]

A world without any legal protection for novel ideas or creative works is a world that does not share them freely.

That is why copyright law was originally created. Without it, there is little incentive to invest in the creation or disemmination of the works in the first place.

Edit: I am not defending the current form of those laws. The time period is too long for one thing. But removing it entirely would be a bad idea, IMHO.

[puppycodes]

I disagree. But I think we are operating on a different premise. My critique is wider and includes capitalism as a system, too much to cover in a reply on HN but idealogically it boils down to entitled thinking where people feel they are the protagonist and somehow "unique" among all other human beings and then expect to become a landlord for ideas. There are lots of ways to create capital and profit without being a patent troll.

[MattPalmer1086]

Granted, if we were operating in an entirely different economic system, my points may be moot.

I don't much see the need for our current copyright or patent law in a post-scarcity Star-Trek society, for example. Although even then, I still don't discount the need for some legal protection on creative works (e.g. the right to be known as the author).

[puppycodes]

There is always some middle ground that makes sense with things like this and i'm sure there are exceptions like there are to any rule but i'm just trying to dream a little bigger...

at the same time point out that people love to apply the idea of physical objects to a digital world and I wish they would just stop trying to put the square peg in the round hole.