My alternative busines model

[MJ Ray]

Niall Douglas <s_fsfeurope at nedprod.com> wrote:
> This is off-topic, but no - I consider monopolies to be the 
> inevitable consequence of capitalism. [...]

I'm not so sure this is off-topic.  I think it is probably one of the
beliefs that you have not been stating that is wildly different to most
people in this group, I think.

> We use artifical legal restraints to try and prevent them but it's a bad
> fit and never truly successful.

The "artificial legal restraints" are what grants the current set of
business monopolies: copyrights and patents.  There is nothing natural or
innate about one business being able to prevent its competitor from
mimicking its public methods.

We have found a way that copyrights can be used for the opposite goal: to
prevent monopolies; and I hope that someone has found or will soon find a
similar tool for patents.  The difficulty is that we are probably further
behind on the patent "arms race" than the copyright one.

Maybe abolishing these legal restraints would be a good thing, but that
would be a very large structural change and I doubt we could forsee the
outcome reliably.  Anyone up for a gamble?

> That's one of the many reasons capitalism
> is broken and will have to be replaced someday.

For now, it's the last man standing in this part of the world... can you
forsee anything replacing it?

-- 
MJR|                                                                  v
---|--[ Something else will appear here eventually, I guess...  ]-----|
   `--[ http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ ]---------[ slef at jabber.at ]-----'