copyrights. Do they violate the fifth or eight command

[cw_theology]

there is a previous thread that I started regarding counterfeit clothing. Which is immoral as the designs are copyrighted. So the question is this, is counterfeitng violating the 8th command or the 5th command. At first glance you want to say both, but then when you think about it saying it violates the 8th command does not make sense. John Frame lays that out here https://frame-poythress.org/the-other-shoe-or-copyright-and-the-reasonable-use-of-technology/ the argument goes. If a carpenter made a table and sold it to you, would you be stealing if you created an identical table and then sold your verstion? The answer seems to be obiously not. So then when we take this to the level of modern counterfiets. When nike makes a shirt would I be stealing if I created an identical shirt copying the logo and everythig and then sold it? Because it is the same example just with a different item. Both stand or fall together. It seems the only thing that makes the nike option immoral and the carpenter one moral is copyright laws, which makes these violations of the 5th command rather then the 8th right? What are your guys thoughts?

 

[Eyedoc84]

It breaks the 9th if you are passing it off as something it isn’t for your gain. You cannot copy the design of the table and sign it with the carpenter’s signature or logo and sell it as if he did it. As far as copyright laws, I think many of them are possibly immoral, but you are breaking the 5th if in a country that upholds them and you intentionally violate them.

 

[cw_theology]

It breaks the 9th if you are passing it off as something it isn’t for your gain. You cannot copy the design of the table and sign it with the carpenter’s signature or logo and sell it as if he did it. As far as copyright laws, I think many of them are possibly immoral, but you are breaking the 5th if in a country that upholds them and you intentionally violate them.

I think this is a fair assessments

 

[Logan]

If a carpenter made a table and sold it to you, would you be stealing if you created an identical table and then sold your verstion? The answer seems to be obiously not.

I would say that this is not actually always obvious.

If a carpenter simply sells tables and I decide to sell tables too (and it ends up eating into the carpenter's profits) then that is simply competition and I don't see a problem with that.

But if the carpenter has come up with some new and desirable design and I purchase a table for the purpose of figuring it out, copying it, and getting some profit at the expense of the carpenter's market, then that does seem like a moral question to me. All other things being equal, I would have stolen some of the carpenter's livelihood, stolen the time he took to invent and innovate (which I didn't have to spend), and stolen his ideas and creativity.

We see the latter situation regularly with Russia and China. We spend millions of dollars in research to figure out some new technology and when we try to regain some of that outlay of expenses, those countries just steal the plans and build it with nary a cent paid to the creators. The laborer is worthy of his wages.

Now, that being said, it becomes a bit more complicated because in many cases copyright law has become so overwhelmed by corporations and lobbyists that it does indeed need a drastic overhaul. 95 years (long past the death of the creator and even their descendants) is grossly excessive. Thank Disney for that one. DRM and the claim that you don't own a digital copy, you're only licensing it, is theft itself. Buying copyrights or patents and then using them not for the good of humanity but just so you can sue anyone who comes up with a similar design is also theft. Sitting on copyrights and never allowing anyone to benefit from them (but suing those who want to) is immoral. These are laws that should be reformed, for sure. But copyrights/patents/trademarks are not in themselves immoral.

Now in your shirt example, go ahead and sell the shirt but leave off the logo (trademark). I assume the main reason you would have that logo is to capitalize on Nike's brand and popularity, which is both 8th and 9th commandment violations.

 

[Edward]

. If a carpenter made a table and sold it to you, would you be stealing if you created an identical table and then sold your verstion? The answer seems to be obiously not.

It depends. Here's a two page article that discusses design protection for furniture:

https://grr.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/gg-copyr-trd-drs-ptent-cons.pdf

 

[Frisian Gardener]

Of the major IP categories of patents, copyrights, and trademarks, trademarks have the most Biblical warrant. A trademark is a modern-day form of a seal, denoting a source of origin, and false marking of a trademark is really a kind of forgery. WLC 145 lists forgery as a violation of the 9th commandment; the proof text is 1 Kings 21:8, in which Jezebel misappropriates Ahab's hand and seal in her scheme to take Naboth's vineyard. It can be argued that false patent marking is a like kind of forgery.

So in response to OP's example of a counterfeit Nike shirt, the purpose of trademark is to identify source. A shirt with Nike's logo indicates to the buyer that it meets Nike's standards of quality, with its reputation or "goodwill" built up over 50 years. A manufacturer putting the logo on a lower-quality shirt is feeding off Nike's reputation, and when the shirt falls apart or fades after only two times in the laundry, it damages that reputation.

Copyright is a product of easy reproduction (e.g., printing press, photography) and patent a product of the Industrial Revolution -- you didn't need protection on your improved plow if it took the next blacksmith the same time and effort to make it as you did. The guild system also worked to protect manufacturing processes as trade secrets.

I believe patents are a permissible application of the general government mandate to praise those that do well (Romans 13:3, 1 Peter 2:14), particularly those who fulfill the creation mandate to subdue and take dominion over the earth (Genesis 1:28). This is not to say that there are abuses of the system, or that contemporary patent law is not in need of reform.

Copyright probably stands on the weakest ground -- the best justification I can think of immediately is an application of 1 Timothy 5:18. American copyright law is a mess as a collection of statutes written in response to each new form of reproducing and distributing content (all the way back to piano rolls) -- it really needs to be demolished and rebuilt from scratch.

In general, IP protection in its current form is more covenantal than moral (what is God's standard for a patent term?), a fifth commandment violation more than an eighth commandment violation. We may already be past the point where copyright can reasonably be enforced, and further innovations in 3D printing may be the tipping point against many patent categories.

Specifically with respect to industrial design, copyright and design patents are narrow. You can prevent somebody from making an exact replica of your table, as long as you meet creativity and novelty standards, but you can't prevent yourself from being the fountainhead of a whole design trend.

 

[Edward]

Copyright probably stands on the weakest ground -- the best justification I can think of immediately is an application of 1 Timothy 5:18. American copyright law is a mess as a collection of statutes written in response to each new form of reproducing and distributing content (all the way back to piano rolls) -- it really needs to be demolished and rebuilt from scratch.

More like 'built on Disney and Sony money' and influenced by the New World Order (see the Berne Convention, the WIPO Copyright Treaty, and the WIPO Performance and Phonograms Treaty, for example. I do agree that the whole thing needs to be re-structured to protect creators, not the companies. The companies can protect themselves through employement agreements.

(And let's not forget the Beijing Treaty. Because where's a better place to look to for private property rights than a communist country.)

 

[cw_theology]

Of the major IP categories of patents, copyrights, and trademarks, trademarks have the most Biblical warrant. A trademark is a modern-day form of a seal, denoting a source of origin, and false marking of a trademark is really a kind of forgery. WLC 145 lists forgery as a violation of the 9th commandment; the proof text is 1 Kings 21:8, in which Jezebel misappropriates Ahab's hand and seal in her scheme to take Naboth's vineyard. It can be argued that false patent marking is a like kind of forgery.

So in response to OP's example of a counterfeit Nike shirt, the purpose of trademark is to identify source. A shirt with Nike's logo indicates to the buyer that it meets Nike's standards of quality, with its reputation or "goodwill" built up over 50 years. A manufacturer putting the logo on a lower-quality shirt is feeding off Nike's reputation, and when the shirt falls apart or fades after only two times in the laundry, it damages that reputation.

Copyright is a product of easy reproduction (e.g., printing press, photography) and patent a product of the Industrial Revolution -- you didn't need protection on your improved plow if it took the next blacksmith the same time and effort to make it as you did. The guild system also worked to protect manufacturing processes as trade secrets.

I believe patents are a permissible application of the general government mandate to praise those that do well (Romans 13:3, 1 Peter 2:14), particularly those who fulfill the creation mandate to subdue and take dominion over the earth (Genesis 1:28). This is not to say that there are abuses of the system, or that contemporary patent law is not in need of reform.

Copyright probably stands on the weakest ground -- the best justification I can think of immediately is an application of 1 Timothy 5:18. American copyright law is a mess as a collection of statutes written in response to each new form of reproducing and distributing content (all the way back to piano rolls) -- it really needs to be demolished and rebuilt from scratch.

In general, IP protection in its current form is more covenantal than moral (what is God's standard for a patent term?), a fifth commandment violation more than an eighth commandment violation. We may already be past the point where copyright can reasonably be enforced, and further innovations in 3D printing may be the tipping point against many patent categories.

Specifically with respect to industrial design, copyright and design patents are narrow. You can prevent somebody from making an exact replica of your table, as long as you meet creativity and novelty standards, but you can't prevent yourself from being the fountainhead of a whole design trend.

This is very good, thanks

 

[Ben Zartman]

I have a patent for something I invented, and as far as protecting from intellectual property theft, it will do nothing. Change a minuscule portion, and my patent is essentially unenforceable. Or go to China with the design and have them crank out thousands of parts with no real repercussions.
The real use of the patent, for me, is street cred. When (if) I go to investors to licence the product, or develop it further (it's part of a whole system I'm working on), showing them patented parts with more in the works is huge. It shows I have some skin in the game, know what I'm talking about, and can bring the system along its path to completion.
It also protects me from being sued by someone who sees my idea, patents it, and tries to claim invention. They can't do that, since I have first dibs, as it were, with my published patent.