Openism, IPism, fundamentalism, and pragmatism

Abstract

On that day, U.S. financial-services firm Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy protection. This bankruptcy filing, the largest in U.S. history, threatened to turn the economic recession of the 2007–2008 financial crisis into a full-scale economic depression. Only the drastic measures taken by the U.S. government averted that catastrophic possibility. But, in the minds of many people, this event shredded the dogma of capitalism as the ultimate and best economic system, just as the dissolution of the Soviet Union on December 26, 1991, shredded the dogma of communism as the ultimate and best economic system. Of course, just as communists once did, many of today's capitalists blame these failures not on the system itself , but rather on its being " impurely " or " improperly " applied. Yet, history shows that fundamentalist ideas rarely work over the long term, and we are likely destined to move toward the more pragmatic reality of state-regulated free markets. Mark Carney, the governor of the Bank of England, recently asserted, " unchecked market fundamentalism can devour the social capital essential for the long-term dynamism of capitalism itself. " Just as ownership of tangible property was the main battleground over which capitalism and communism fought in the 20 th century, ownership of intellectual property is fast becoming the battleground in the 21 st century, with today's economy being increasingly driven by large corporations dependent on these intangible assets. At one end, " IP capitalists " view intellectual property as no different than tangible property. IP capitalists chafe at the limited term of copyright and see nothing wrong with the activity of patent-assertion entities (also known as " patent trolls "), who enforce patent rights in an attempt to collect licensing fees, without manufacturing products or supplying services based upon the underlying patents. At the other end, " IP communists " object to copyright protection and software patents, and even argue that software should be free. It is regrettable, I believe, that the open access (OA) movement found itself in the IP communist camp. OA advocates unrestricted online access to peer-reviewed scholarly research. On the face of it, this idea is seductively attractive. Who can object to unrestricted access to research? Furthermore, after seeing the price of scholarly publications escalate in the 1990s, open access seemed like a perfect solution; no more escalating subscription fees. But just like any other intellectual property, online publishing has fixed …