1 Name Professor Course Date Intellectual property When an individual invents something, he owns it, but the difference

is that, unlike the physical properties, many people can use the innovation at the same time. This then makes it an issue where intellectual property lawyers and activists call for government protection other than the ideas to face the market competition, and this is to guard against its illegal use. Someone would wonder why on earth the market should governments control markets when it can already regulate itself. The free market is just enough to ensure protection of intellectual property as well as its prevention from abuse. Intellectual property defines creations of an individuals mind or simply proprietary knowledge that is lawfully protected through accordance of exclusive rights of ownership (World Intellectual Property Organization, 1997, 1). The two categories of intellectual property include industrial property and copyright. Industrial intellectual properties include patents, trademarks, industrial designs, and geographic indications of source while copyrights include literary and artistic works such as novels, films, paintings, and musical works just to mention a few. Opponents of the protection of intellectual property argue that there are a number of pessimistic consequences of the tenure of information where it provides a venue for retardation of novelty and abuse of poor countries (Kinsella, 2011, 1). This means that, in as much as the

2 idea behind patents is that basics of a creation become available to public while the inventor gets a limited time for the exclusive right over use or sale of the invention, there are cases where patents where its use suppresses innovation. For instance, companies can opt to buy someones patent just to ensure that it inhibits others from applying the ideas. Additionally, some rich companies take out patents on numerous genetic codes of lets say all transgenic forms of the entire species; this subsequently inhibits non patent holders from carrying out research on the species. For example, it is wrong when first world countries patent genetic materials found in developing countries, which means that, for countries to use the genetic materials that have been available to them from the distant past, they have to pay for them (Kinsella, 2011, 1). This extracts wealth from poor countries when it could be fair that ideas rich countries produce are made available to poor countries at no cost. Moreover, when IP lawyers call for IP protection, this is normally to bring financial returns to the innovators. However, this is not usually the case because the individual inventors do not gain much for their sponsors ignore them. For example, an employee for a corporation can make an invention, but instead of the individual reaping from his creation, the organization patents it and gains from it. Another issue that the opponents of IP protection strongly disagree is that the fact that IOP can be sold it means that it is only the rich and the powerful that benefit yet they seldom contribute much to the creation of new ideas (Kinsella 2011, p.1). Meanwhile, proponents of IP protection argue that exclusive rights enable innovators and inventors to benefit from their created property financially (World Intellectual Property Organization 1997, p.18). Additionally, proponents of IP protection argue that creators of ideas have a right to possess as well as personally use what they have developed, therefore, deserve property rights because of their labor. This means that just like the physical property holders

3 have rights of possession over their properties so should be creators of ideas. Another argument for IP protection is that private property is a way for advancing the privacy and a means for personal sovereignty. Holland et al (2007, p.2) also adds that rights of IP are essential for the promotion of creation of even more ideas such that the society continues to be creative. There are laws and legal principles that govern IP, and it is noteworthy that they vary from country to country, and they have also evolved over centuries. Therefore, IP law is a general name that refers to the legislation governing IP rights and in Australia, it means representing the property of ones mind or intellect (World Intellectual Property Organization 1997, p.22). IP Australia is a government organization that is in charge of inventory of all intellectual properties in Australia, and it noteworthy that Australia is among the top ten countries in the world with a modern and effective IP regime. It is certain that there are various types of IP protection that are available, and they differ depending on terms of protection, application requirements and benefits (Kinsella 2011, p.1). One of the ways to protect IP is through the use of patents, and a patent is a right that government grants an individual for a device, substance, method or any process which is new, inventive and useful that it can lead to material gain. Therefore, a patent has legal rights that stop third parties from reproducing, using or simply selling an invention. Patents Act 1990 protects this provision, however; there are some exceptions, and this is where the inventions are just mental processes with no useful applications (World Intellectual Property Organization 1997, p.5). Meanwhile, there are two types of patents which are a standard patent and an innovation patent, and they are distinct from each other on grounds of the duration of the patent. A standard patent lasts for up to 20 years whereas an innovation patent goes up to a maximum of eight

4 years. Meanwhile, there are also international patents where individuals can decide to choose to protect his ideas from other countries abuse. Trademarks are legal protections that a traders uses to distinguish his goods and services from those of other traders (Holland et al 2007, p.9). Trademarks come in different forms where they can range from a word, phrase sound, smell or even picture among many others, and it is noteworthy that they are different from a business, company and domain name. This implies that a businessman cannot register a word that describes goods or services in a direct manner as his trademark. Plant breeders rights also function as IP protection method where it consists of exclusive commercial rights to a registered variety. This protects new varieties of plants and animals and it occurs through the issuance of exclusive commercial rights to an individual as regards the marketing and the reproductive material of the animal or plant. However, this requires that the breeder gives evidence that the variety is new and distinguishable from others and that it is uniform and stable (Holland et al 2007, p.3). Meanwhile, copyright laws protect against the reproduction and use of unique expression of thoughts and not the thoughts themselves. Therefore, copyright protection applies from the time of creation of original works of art, songs, movies, broadcasts or even computer programs so that no one reproduces it in the event of publication. Trade secrets can also be protected, and they may range from special recipes or formulations where the best to this protection is to have employees accessible to secret sign confidentiality agreements (Holland et al 2007, p.10). Having seen the IP protection methods, it is noteworthy that the laws compromise the free market economy. This is because the government standardizes the production and

5 consumption of commodities and services, and this sets the market prices. This negates the free market theory that suggests that price supply and demand of goods determine the market prices. This price helps consumers to communicate to the producers the demand for their product and services, and this, in turn, directs the producers on how they can allocate resources with an aim of satisfying consumers and investors. Therefore, the system of prices emanate from the voluntary actions that happen in market places other than political decrees, which is usually the case in controlled markets (Kinsella 2011, p.1). For that matter, it is insignificant to control markets just to prevent abuses of intellectual property. This is so because chances are that markets get to balance themselves out naturally in the end. It is noteworthy that there are persistent arguments that IP rights are essential for the protection of inventors and innovators, and one can judge that the reasoning behind this is to guard against competition from other companies as a larger company can just knock off ones idea if the individual has no IP rights. This means that proponents of IP protection are weary of market competition from other entrepreneurs, and this implies that they support monopoly rights on anticompetitive grounds. Monopoly is a situation where governments can decide to give some companies a leeway in their sale of products or services by shutting down entry points for other companies into the market to wade off competition (Kinsella 2011, p.1). It is apparent that even though, IP proponents assert that they are in favor of a competitive free market, the fact is that they are only capable of tolerating competition if there is difficult competition and at the same time there are high barriers to entry. In some cases, patent lawyers and even some Libertarians get offended if an individual refers to patents or copyright as a monopoly. To the IP proponents a patent cannot be a monopoly but a property right. What they forget is that patents are state grants of monopoly,

6 privilege and England was the country that issued the first patent (World Intellectual Property Organization 1997, p.17). At the time, government used the patent to raise money without taxation, and the dispensation of these patents helped in safeguarding the allegiance of favorites (Kinsella 2011, p.1). Meanwhile, the government in turn was to shield the patentee from competition, and all these were at the expense of market competition and consumers. However, these days, times have changed, the IP is now subject to democracy and institutionalization, and this means that anyone can apply and get IP protection. This has led to companies applying for patents just to keep other competitors at bay, which translates into the defensive use of IP protection. Therefore, there should not be IP protection for intellectual property, for it encourages a system of ownership where it encourages individuals to adore distinct interests other than general interests. However, what people forget is that sharing information is advantageous to the larger populations if there is less credit for ideas, people will get to share the information freely other than worrying about who deserves credit for the ideas. Therefore, there should not be laws that protect IP, for it is only through this that, there would be free markets for everyone to participate and gain equally.

7 List of References Holland, C. Reed, D.Lee, S. Kimwel, A and Peterson, W. 2007. Intellectual Property: Patents, Trademarks, Copyrights and Trade Secrets. Irvin, California: Entrepreneur Press Kinsella, S. 2011. How intellectual property hampers free market, Retrieved on 24th Sep 2012 from < http://www.thefreemanonline.org/features/how-intellectual-property-hampers-the-freemarket/ > World Intellectual Property Organization. 1997. Introduction to Intellectual Property: Theory and Practice, Netherlands, UK: Kluwer Law International.