(no subject)
on the patenting of immaterial property:
"Many forms of immaterial property appear immediately to be unjust with respect to the accepted norms and thus require dramatic legal innovations. We can see this clearly, for example, in the case of "bioproperty," that is, life-forms that have been eligible for private ownership, but at question here is a more general for of bioproperty. Traditionally one can own one or ten or a hndred Holstein cows or Macintosh apple trees, but one cannot own Holstein cow or Macintosh apple tree as a life-form ... Perhaps the most celebrated and controversial new example of such bioproperty is OncoMouse, the only animal trpe to date that has been patented.
Du Pont laboratories together with Harvard University created Onco mouse (which is) predisposed to developing cancerous tumors and is thus useful for oncological research. Du Pont sells individual mice as research tools, but the novel aspect here is that Du Pont does not merely own individual mice but the type of mouse as a whole.
... The legal innovation to protect such immaterial private property rests on a recognition of immaterial labor, ... what(is) considered part of nature and thus common property, is really the product of human labor and invention, and thus eligible for private ownership.
... It is worth recounting as illustration one of the most widely discussed cases over the ownership of human genetic information that is valuable for medical treatment and research. In 1976 a patient at the University of California medical center began treatment for hairy-cell leukemia. The docotors recognized that his blood might have special properties for the treatment of leukemia and- in 1981, they were granted a patent in the name of the University of California on a T-cell line-that is, a sequence of genetic information-developed from the patient's blood;
the potential value of the products derived for it was estimated at three billion dollars. The patient sued the university for ownership of the T cells and the genetic information, but the California Supreme Court ruled against him. The court reasoned that the University of California was the rightful owner of the cell line because a naturally occuring organism (on which his claim rests) is not patentable, whereas the information scientists derive from it is patentable because it is the result of human ingenuity.
...Increasingly, today, ... private ownership that limits access to ideas and information thwarts creativity and innovation. Scholars and practitioners of Internet technologies have long insisted that wheras the early creativity of the cybernetic revolution and the development of the Internet were made possible by an extraordinary openness and access to information and technologies, all of this is now being progressively closed at all levels: physical connections, code, and content. The privatisation of the electronic 'commons' has become an onstacle to further innovation."
"Many forms of immaterial property appear immediately to be unjust with respect to the accepted norms and thus require dramatic legal innovations. We can see this clearly, for example, in the case of "bioproperty," that is, life-forms that have been eligible for private ownership, but at question here is a more general for of bioproperty. Traditionally one can own one or ten or a hndred Holstein cows or Macintosh apple trees, but one cannot own Holstein cow or Macintosh apple tree as a life-form ... Perhaps the most celebrated and controversial new example of such bioproperty is OncoMouse, the only animal trpe to date that has been patented.
Du Pont laboratories together with Harvard University created Onco mouse (which is) predisposed to developing cancerous tumors and is thus useful for oncological research. Du Pont sells individual mice as research tools, but the novel aspect here is that Du Pont does not merely own individual mice but the type of mouse as a whole.
... The legal innovation to protect such immaterial private property rests on a recognition of immaterial labor, ... what(is) considered part of nature and thus common property, is really the product of human labor and invention, and thus eligible for private ownership.
... It is worth recounting as illustration one of the most widely discussed cases over the ownership of human genetic information that is valuable for medical treatment and research. In 1976 a patient at the University of California medical center began treatment for hairy-cell leukemia. The docotors recognized that his blood might have special properties for the treatment of leukemia and- in 1981, they were granted a patent in the name of the University of California on a T-cell line-that is, a sequence of genetic information-developed from the patient's blood;
the potential value of the products derived for it was estimated at three billion dollars. The patient sued the university for ownership of the T cells and the genetic information, but the California Supreme Court ruled against him. The court reasoned that the University of California was the rightful owner of the cell line because a naturally occuring organism (on which his claim rests) is not patentable, whereas the information scientists derive from it is patentable because it is the result of human ingenuity.
...Increasingly, today, ... private ownership that limits access to ideas and information thwarts creativity and innovation. Scholars and practitioners of Internet technologies have long insisted that wheras the early creativity of the cybernetic revolution and the development of the Internet were made possible by an extraordinary openness and access to information and technologies, all of this is now being progressively closed at all levels: physical connections, code, and content. The privatisation of the electronic 'commons' has become an onstacle to further innovation."