Re: NGOs and the Indulgence Racket (was re: Compulsory licenses andaccess to essential medicines NGO-sponsored meeting in Geneva, March 26,1999)

["Phillip Hallam-Baker" <hallam@ai.mit.edu>]

There has been a provision for forced licensing of patents in English
law since before the US government existed.


Please spare us the rants about the moral superiority of the US
understanding of property.

I know that certain opinions about property were common in the colonies,
such as the opinion that the rights of property included the 'right' to
exploit
slaves and the 'right' to appropriate native american land at whim.


Intellectual property is a privillege granted towards a social end and
not an absolute right unconstrained by any responsibility.

Governments have always appropriated property in times of war, in
parts of Africa over a third of the population are infected with HIV
creating
a social crisis which is having a much greater impact than most wars.


You can yell 'let them eat cake' as much as you like. They will ignore
you and for very good reason.

        Phill


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