Patent and copyright law are stifling innovation and threatening the global economy according to two economists at Washington University in St. Louis in a new book, Against Intellectual Monopoly.

"In high-technology markets, disruptive innovation is something to be taken as a given, like gravity. Businesspeople do their best to exploit it, avoid it or cope with it. Industry upstarts depend on it, while established companies fear it. But no one in the competitive world of high technology thinks they can stop disruptive innovation, any more than they can alter the laws of gravity. But what if you could? What if an industry could banish disruptive innovation, leaving only a "well-mannered marketplace" of incremental innovations that reinforced comfortable business models?

Twelve years after the passage of the controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), the law continues to stymie fair use, free speech, scientific research, and legitimate competition.

Twelve years after the passage of the controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), the law continues to stymie fair use, free speech, scientific research, and legitimate competition.

If you're getting sued for patent infringement, you have a right to know who is really behind the lawsuit, and so does the public. So I started digging up publicly available information. What I found amazed me - so many patent plaintiffs, especially in the Eastern District of Texas, make no products, and just try to extract money out of their IP.

"It is common to argue that intellectual property in the form of copyright and patent is necessary for the innovation and creation of ideas and inventions such as machines, drugs, computer software, books, music, literature and movies. In fact intellectual property is a government grant of a costly and dangerous private monopoly over ideas. We show through theory and example that intellectual monopoly is not necessary for innovation and as a practical matter is damaging to growth, prosperity and liberty."

It is an economic book that build a devastating case against patent and copyright laws.

Notes: It seem that book marks the GPL and other free software license as the exception and is something that they see as beneficial. It is something if possible they want to see preserved.

"Back in 2007, IP Innovation filed a lawsuit against Red Hat and Novell. IP Innovation is a subsidiary of Acacia Technologies. You may have heard of them — they're reported to be the most litigious patent troll in the USA

IP Innovation LLC has just filed a patent infringement claim against Red Hat and Novell. It was filed October 9, case no. 2:2007cv00447, IP Innovation, LLC et al v. Red Hat Inc. et al, in Texas. Where else? The patent troll magnet state. And now let's play, where's Microsoft?

Ruby on Rails 2.3.8 has been released to fix yesterday's release of Ruby on Rails 2.3.7 which had unintended consequences for all Rails users