“It seems that Locke had in mind rival goods when he developed his theory (if one consumes it, others can’t). What happens to non-rival goods like ideas? George Bernard Shaw famously said that if you and I have an apple and we exchange apples, you would only have one apple but if you and I have an idea and we exchanged them, we will have two ideas. So, how is it possible to treat ideas as if they were apples i. e. to make them into commodities? It is only through copyright that it is possible to produce scarcity out of ideas and this of course can produce serious benefits for some but not all”

—  Mattin

Page 180.
"Anti-Copyright: Why Improvisation and Noise Run Against the Idea of Intellectual Property" (October 2008)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "It seems that Locke had in mind rival goods when he developed his theory (if one consumes it, others can’t). What happe…" by Mattin?
Mattin photo
Mattin 18
Spanish musician 1977

Related quotes

George Bernard Shaw photo

“If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

George Bernard Shaw never said these words, but Charles F. Brannan did. http://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/12/13/swap-ideas/
Misattributed

Leonard Cohen photo
Eric S. Raymond photo
Daniel Lyons photo

“I still have no desire to own [an Apple Watch], or even any desire to go to the Apple store and look at one or hold one in my hand. … The only question, it seems to me, is this: At what point can Apple Watch be declared a swing and a miss?”

Daniel Lyons (1960) American writer

I can’t get excited about the Apple Watch http://goodreads.com/author_blog_posts/8481697-i-can-t-get-excited-about-the-apple-watch in Goodreads (3 June 2015)

Edward Witten photo

“Good wrong ideas are extremely scarce… and good wrong ideas that even remotely rival the majesty of string theory have never been seen.”

Edward Witten (1951) American theoretical physicist

as quoted by John Horgan, The End of Science: Facing the Limits of Knowledge in the Twilight of the Scientific Age (1996)

Herman Melville photo
Richelle Mead photo
Linus Pauling photo

“If you want to have good ideas you must have many ideas. Most of them will be wrong, and what you have to learn is which ones to throw away.”

Linus Pauling (1901–1994) American scientist

As quoted by Francis Crick in his presentation "The Impact of Linus Pauling on Molecular Biology" http://oregonstate.edu/dept/Special_Collections/subpages/ahp/1995symposium/crick.html (1995).
1990s

Khaled Hosseini photo

Related topics