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Freedom

Strange Coincidences: Tainted Toothpaste and the Intellectual Property Cops

It seemed a little fishy earlier this year when news first broke of tainted toothpaste from China. Was it totally coincidental that those disclosures came just as Congress was about […]

By Jonathan Rowe | 02 Sep 07 | Also posted in Intellectual Property | Comments (0)

Property and Freedom: Those Who Saw What Was Coming

In my last post I reflected on how an excessive assertion of property rights can turn this supposed bulwark of freedom into a threat to it.  Intellectual property is an especially […]

By Jonathan Rowe | 25 May 07 | Also posted in Commons, Intellectual Property | Comments (0)

The Property Police State: Alberto Gonzalez Seeks More Power to Tap Our Phones

There was a time, long ago, when the concept of “property” was a bulwark against an oppressive and arbitrary state. But the supposed bulwark has turned into a means of […]

By Jonathan Rowe | 19 May 07 | Also posted in Intellectual Property | Comments (0)

The Technology of Obedience: Corporate Research and the Invisible Hand

Is technology an independent force that evolves inexorably along a particular path – the path of best answers?  Or do the corporations that drive innovation steer it towards their own […]

By Jonathan Rowe | 12 Dec 06 | Also posted in Technology | Comments (0)

The Vise Tightens

I was in Washington this week and Capitol Hill feels like a state of siege.   The place is saturated with police – not friendly cops walking the beat, but police […]

By Jonathan Rowe | 11 Dec 05 | Also posted in Commons | Comments (0)

Lineage

Presidential inaugurations are the kind of scripted rituals that only a numbed-out media would take seriously. I’ve always wondered why the Washington Post and New York Times don’t assign their […]

By Jonathan Rowe | 21 Jan 05 | Comments (0)