July, 2014 | Bacon's Promise

Monthly Archives: July 2014

“Net Neutrality” and The New Enclosure (Part I)

Those of us who oppose allowing Internet service providers to impose tolls on users wanting to use higher broadband transmission speeds are rowing upstream. This is not only because powerful interests—among them, AT&T, Verizon, and cable companies—want to exploit U.S. policy’s current treatment of Internet access as a commercial commodity, rather than a public utility. […]

July 14, 2014 – 4:43 pm | By Sylvia Kraemer | Posted in Current History, History of Ideas, Intellectual Property, Open Systems, Politics | Tagged "sunshine"laws, enclosure movements, Freedom of Access, Freedom of Information, Jack Schaefer's "Shane", Johnson County Range War, National Academy of Sciences advisory committees, National Health Care Reform Task Force, open access laws, public information, Vice President Cheney's Energy Task Force | Comments (0)

The New Enclosure (Part II)

The notion that the things we create belong to us is not new; it dates back at least to 560, when Ireland’s King Diarrmait ruled against the monk Colmcille, who had secretly copied his mentor Finnian’s psalter. (Legend records Diarmait’s judgment as “To every cow belongs her calf, therefore to every book belongs its copy.”) […]

July 14, 2014 – 4:42 pm | By Sylvia Kraemer | Posted in Environmental Policy, Intellectual Property, Open Systems, Science and Engineering in the Law, Science and Policy, Technology in US Politics, Uncategorized | Tagged Atomic Energy Commission, Bayh-Dole, Daniel S. Greenberg, Department of Defense, EPA standards, federal procurements, federal R&D, FOIA, Forsham v. Harris, Freedom of Information Act, Human Genome Project, intellectual capital, Justice John McLean, King Diarrmait, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Institutes of Health, Office of Management and Budget, patent licenses, patent royalties, patents, President Bill Clinton, President Kennedy, President Truman, Prime Minister Tony Blair, privatization, proprietary claims, public commons, public sphere, Publicly Funded Research, Ronald Reagan, Shelby Amendment, Wheaton v. Peters | Comments (0)

The New Enclosure (Part III)

Discussions of patent policy in the United States and elsewhere often overlook the fact that the original intent of issuing patents (not to be confused with sovereign-granted commercial privileges) was to encourage the disclosure and spread of novel devices to stimulate manufacturing and trade. The earliest patents (such as those awarded by the Republic […]

July 14, 2014 – 4:41 pm | By Sylvia Kraemer | Posted in Current History, Intellectual Property, Open Systems, Science and Engineering in the Law, Science and Policy, Technology in US Politics | Tagged Atomic Energy Commission, Bayh-Dole, Daniel S. Greenberg, Department of Defense, EPA standards, federal procurements, federal R&D, FOIA, Forsham v. Harris, Freedom of Information Act, Human Genome Project, intellectual capital, Justice John McLean, King Diarrmait, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Institutes of Health, Office of Management and Budget, patent licenses, patents, President Bill Clinton, President Kennedy, President Truman, Prime Minister Tony Blair, privatization, proprietary claims, public commons, public sphere, Publicly Funded Research, Ronald Reagan, Shelby Amendment, Wheaton v. Peters | Comments (0)