You're missing that I'm trying to figure out how this actually works. Not saying how it should work. I'm not a sovereign citizen here, merely a confused citizen.
> Can you point to anything to support that understanding of "secure"?
I'm a regular person who is trying to interpret the law. I'm failing. This is probably because I'm getting too lost in thought. But the law should be clear enough that regular people can understand it without citation or legal knowledge. It should not be a specialized field except that specialists have broad facility in application. It's a definite improvement that modern laws abandoned parsimony for as precise as possible definition of terms.
That's all.
And the plain meaning of "secure" at the time was: "The sense of "get possession of, make oneself master of" is from 1743." https://www.etymonline.com/word/secure With "no one can serve two masters" a biblical phrase that Jefferson would have been well familiar with.
> This is all besides that if an owner can license, then transferring the IP itself is trivial, as one can grant a license that covers all aspects of the exclusive rights.
Exactly. I did eventually figure this out. I still think that it's a sophistic end-run around the plain text of the clause, unless said license includes a clawback provision that the author/inventor can unilaterally initiate.
But I also believe that the founders knew about the Sophists, Shakespear's Merchant of Venice, and the like, as well as some of the arguments at the time over what to include in the Constitution. And that if they wrote ambiguity into Constitutional provisions, they likely did so on purpose. Definitional changes accounted for. Which puts me at odds with most jurisprudence.
This conversation is becoming absurd. I do not understand how you read that definition of secure to mean that the master cannot sell their own shop. I’ve repeatedly asked you for your support on what is a very esoteric reading of the word secure, as opposed to the plain reading I keep providing to you. It’s one thing for you to speculate, but to insist that your forced reading is the plain one is a bit ridiculous IMO. I’m well aware that the law needs to be written clearly for plain understanding, it is. You are the one advancing a meaning that says by giving something to someone, they can’t also then sell it? That doesn’t mesh with the founder’s understandings of property rights at all or the definitions themselves.
It’s a bit of a joke, and I guess you don’t realize it. But the point about academic references is that you are making an academic argument. You’d think that if your point was true, that it is SO OBVIOUSLY beyond the plain meaning of the word, SOMEONE else would have said something in the ensuing 200 years. Yet here we are, you telling me you know what the founders meant, despite all the evidence and common sense running against you. Okay buddy - good luck with that.
It's not just "secure". It is "exclusive". "Exclusive" has always meant "exclusive".
The Constitution only allows congress to "exclusively secure" IP rights to the originators of the material. It does not allow congress to "exclusively secure" rights to anyone else. The only way I can make this work is through an originator licensing a work to a single other entity, and in said license guaranteeing that other entity that the originator will not otherwise use any rights they own except to the extent of the exclusive license to the other entity.
This works. I still think it only really works if the originator has the unilateral power to break the agreement. But I can understand someone legitimately making a counter-argument.
In an originalist sense, the founders were very much against royal grants of monopoly, so limited the power of the government to grant monopolies solely to the originators of ideas.
I'm no longer confused, so yes we can drop this line of discussion. I hope you understand that I wasn't talking about just one word, but the word in the context of the rest of the clause.
It doesn't work and the only historical evidence you can point to is the merchant of venice, not the actual theories of property rights the drafters had in mind. This is an asinine argument. Exclusive here doesn't mean the owner can't sell, it means he's the only person who can decide to sell. That's why it's their exclusive right.
> You’d think that if your point was true, that it is SO OBVIOUSLY beyond the plain meaning of the word, SOMEONE else would have said something in the ensuing 200 years
The only people who would advance an argument against transfer of IP rights are those who don't have standing to make such an argument.
I ask you about any actual writing on this topic to demonstrate that you are making this up wholesale on your own. You haven't rebutted that. You just made my point for me with this ridiculous argument that in the entire history of the constitution of the united states, and all the years of interpreting it since then, everyone has been so invested in being pro-patent, that nobody besides you ever realized that the founders OBVIOUSLY meant that IP owners can't transfer their rights
(what could they do with it then? you realize not all inventors are interested in running businesses? licensing was not a new concept to the founders. obviously you have no rebuttal to this, but I just want to hit the point home because I find your argument so obnoxious in the profundity you think it belies)
including the founders themselves, who you cannot cite to say meant that their entire concept of property rights was somehow distinct when it comes to patents.
YOU ARE TOO USED TO ARGUING WITH OTHER LAWYERS THAT YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN HOW TO CONVERSE AND LEAD PEOPLE TO THE TRUTH.
In my "arguments" as you call them I am not citing jack shit other than the constitution, time-specific definitions, and some recollections.
AGAIN I AM A CITIZEN TRYING TO UNDERSTAND THE LAW BY READING THE PLAIN TEXT OF THE LAW.
> including the founders themselves, who you cannot cite to say meant that their entire concept of property rights was somehow distinct when it comes to patents.
There were a lot of distinctions written into the constitution that separated it from preexisting common law and royal prerogative. Titles of nobility, etcetera. So when trying to understand the basis of the law I necessarily revert to the knowledge that the constitution is the supreme law of the land, and thus it's text is definitive as to jurisdiction and powers.
AGAIN, I SAID THAT I FINALLY UNDERSTOOD THAT THEY CAN EXCLUSIVELY LICENSE THEIR RIGHTS. BUT THE CONSTITUTION DOES NOT GRANT CONGRESS THE AUTHORITY TO GRANT RIGHTS TO SOMEONE WHO IS NOT THE ORIGINATOR. SO I WAS TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW THIS WORKS. *I NOW UNDERSTAND HOW THIS WORKS!!!!* I still think there are holes in it, or of my understanding of it, but these aren't killer holes.
FOR GOD DAMN SAKE. HOW IS IT OBNOXIOUS TO WANT A COMMON CITIZEN TO UNDERSTAND THE VERY LAWS HE LIVES UNDER? AND THEN CALL HIM ASININE AND OBNOXIOUS FOR TRYING TO FIGURE IT OUT VIA DIALOGUE?
>YOU ARE TOO USED TO ARGUING WITH OTHER LAWYERS THAT YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN HOW TO CONVERSE AND LEAD PEOPLE TO THE TRUTH.
No, you're talking out of your ass, and you wont listen to reason.
>AGAIN, I SAID THAT I FINALLY UNDERSTOOD THAT THEY CAN EXCLUSIVELY LICENSE THEIR RIGHTS. BUT THE CONSTITUTION DOES NOT GRANT CONGRESS THE AUTHORITY TO GRANT RIGHTS TO SOMEONE WHO IS NOT THE ORIGINATOR. SO I WAS TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW THIS WORKS. I NOW UNDERSTAND HOW THIS WORKS!!!! I still think there are holes in it, or of my understanding of it, but these aren't killer holes.
Not sure why you think repeating yourself in caps-lock makes a difference. Congress can't grant a patent or a copyright to anyone else but the inventor or the author. The author and the inventor are free to do what they want with that property right. Nothing you said about the word exclusive or anything else changes. This is entirely common sense as I've pointed out to you several times. I also pointed out that your reading of the text is baseless, defies common sense, and the plain definition of any of the words. You, of course, insisted otherwise and that you were obviously correct despite a complete dearth of any kind of support. There's no reason for you to be electronically yelling at me, you got yourself here on your own. You were pompous and rude, why should I be courteous to you at all?
Patents can't sell themselves, just the same as a house or slave. I think that's consistent with their conception of property rights, which save for slavery, remains unchanged in today's society. I do wonder if you think before you post.
> Can you point to anything to support that understanding of "secure"?
I'm a regular person who is trying to interpret the law. I'm failing. This is probably because I'm getting too lost in thought. But the law should be clear enough that regular people can understand it without citation or legal knowledge. It should not be a specialized field except that specialists have broad facility in application. It's a definite improvement that modern laws abandoned parsimony for as precise as possible definition of terms.
That's all.
And the plain meaning of "secure" at the time was: "The sense of "get possession of, make oneself master of" is from 1743." https://www.etymonline.com/word/secure With "no one can serve two masters" a biblical phrase that Jefferson would have been well familiar with.
> This is all besides that if an owner can license, then transferring the IP itself is trivial, as one can grant a license that covers all aspects of the exclusive rights.
Exactly. I did eventually figure this out. I still think that it's a sophistic end-run around the plain text of the clause, unless said license includes a clawback provision that the author/inventor can unilaterally initiate.
But I also believe that the founders knew about the Sophists, Shakespear's Merchant of Venice, and the like, as well as some of the arguments at the time over what to include in the Constitution. And that if they wrote ambiguity into Constitutional provisions, they likely did so on purpose. Definitional changes accounted for. Which puts me at odds with most jurisprudence.