5.1 Free-culture movement

Summary: Free culture movement is a movement for promoting and distributing free content, content that people can use freely. This can be done by internet or the other communication tools. Or promoting the right to free edit the creative content without limitation set by creator. The movement's concept of free to exchange can be aligned with free and open-source-software movement, open access and copyleft movement. 

The free culture movement started after usa president Bill Clinton pass the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act. This act extended copyright protection into 70 years after the producer's death. Lawrence Lessig against this so he started national wide campaign. He speeched almost 100 times in colleges. He made Creative Commons at 2001 in order to promote sharing creative contents to produce cultural, scientific and creative innovations. The word "free culture" has been used since the 2003 World Summit on Information Society. To present free licenses for artistic creation. 

Interesting point: 

The one of opponent of this movement called this movement as "intellectual property communist". This is a bit funny because in the perspective of libertarianism and free market regulations that ensured by stare should be reduced or removed. How can this be a "communist"?

I am not supporter of libertarian capitalism but reduction of copyright and right to freely edit and use cultural products will help humanity. This is proven by historical evidence. 

The James Watt's steam engine improved enormously after the copyright removed. During the time his patent was protected, British steam engines only improved by about 750 horsepower per year. For about 30 years after Watt's patent expired, it steadily improved by about 4,000 horsepower or more each year.

When Boldrin and Levine surveyed readers of the British Medical Journal about the most significant events in medical history, they found that almost all responses were not related to patents. 

(Read this articles if you want to find out more: https://mises.org/library/fight-against-intellectual-property)

Also removing patents in medical field will save a lot of people in this world from the greed of big pharma. 

https://www.msf.org/south-africa-country-takes-landmark-step-access-medicines

"South African patent law currently allows pharmaceutical corporations to easily obtain multiple, undeserved patents on a single drug and charge people exorbitant prices. People with DR-TB in South Africa could not access the drug linezolid while it was under extended patent monopoly and priced at over US$49 per tablet. At the same time, generic versions of the drug were available at as low as $8 in many countries, including in India."

So movement like free culture movement should be encouraged. This will bring benefit to the millions of people in the world.

Questions:

Does removal or reduction of copyright give positive effects to humanity?

What kinds of benefits that gained by both perspectives? Copyright and copyleft.