All human improvement has been the result of the exchange of ideas and or robust debate!

And in a nutshell, we have patents that are supposed to protect original ideas!

And would in many more cases, if we hadn't made the process so dammed expensive and time consuming.

What do you suppose perpetual motion would be worth, and should the mind that created it be worthy of the fruits of his or her labor?

Moreover, it is possible to steal ideas even those supposedly protected by patent; except where they remain hidden in say; an aging head, and a time limited memory. Ah now, what was I saying?

Ah yes, people everywhere, but particularly the poor and downtrodden will vote with their feet when making their purchases.

Anyway, perhaps the only way to protect patents from this type of THEFT, would be complete trade embargoes, until the protected patents are also protected in said offending copycat countries!

That said, I find no grounds that would allow a time limited patent to be further extended on some implausible different use, profit gouging grounds; but particularly where some or all the initial research, was the product of public purse funding and exchanged academic ideas/results!
Rhrosty.

I understand the connection you make between sharing data and its ability to help innovate.
But I for one don't like the intrusiveness of governments looking at my web browsing habits; having access to facebook data etc.
Its not that I have anything to hide but I don't believe they have the right to intrude into peoples lives as much as they do.
Corporations also go too far.
Smart TV's for example not only supply the data of your viewing habits back to companies that produce them, but also watch and listen to you in your own home.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-02-10/samsung-warns-customers-new-smart-tvs-listen-in-on-users/6082144
Car manufacturers not only have GPS systems to track your whereabouts but they are also planning more self driving capabilities that will take over in the event of an accident.
http://www.vox.com/2015/1/18/7629603/car-hacking-dangers
And whilst they want this power over us the question is can these large corporations be trusted?
Take vaccines for example. Were all told that they are safe and effective by governments, manufacturers and the departments that are supposed to provide oversight and safeguards, but they routinely hide the truth from us.
http://www.naturalnews.com/048806_vaccine_petition_White_House_fraud.html#
http://www.greenmedinfo.com/sites/default/files/gpub_58635_anti_therapeutic_action_vaccination_all.pdf

Why should we allow such intrusiveness when they don't provide transparency and cannot be trusted?

But what of closed circuit TV (CCTV) networks that have profiles our faces (or some part of our anatomy) AND follow us everywhere?

http://www.homelandsecuritypk.com/services/cctv/

Can Skype be activated remotely any time?

Patents are a waste of space for most.

We had a patent on a new type of heat exchanger. All that did was give us more chance, but not total assurance, that we could defend our patent in court. Even when you won, the thief was usually a small independent division of a large company, which promptly went bankrupt, allowing no restitution for court costs, or loss of sales.

When Marbon Chemical Company, a division of Borg Warner, now General Electric, developed a new way of polymerising ABS plastic, rather than patent it, they simply kept it secret. The chemists knew that once the technique was detailed in a patent, others could find a slightly modified way of applying the research, which avoided the patent.

It would appear that Nicholas has never spent a great deal of money, finding a new way of doing something himself, or bought the rights to someone else's research. If he had ever had privately developed data, he might be more interested in allowing the researcher to earn a return on their effort, rather than give it to him.

If he is really interested in the public interest, it would be nice if he directed his efforts to getting tax payer funded data released to all, rather than wanting to claim the results of private effort.

Perhaps he could get all the codes for climate models, so others could analyse why they are failing.

Plantagenet,
Put CCTV in EVERY home: Householders should help us trap burglars, says Scotland Yard chief
http://rt.com/uk/239001-cctv-homes-uk-howes/
http://youtu.be/4voKmf3pzBY

Hi Armchair Critic

Great idea. But look at the human toll. The Scotland Yard chief looks terrible - those red eyes. He may have been looking at too many secret CCTVs for too many burger burglers.

Pete

Interestingly data collected by the Government through Census and Electoral registration is available to such entities as commercial debt collectors and betting agencies - check the Act yourself if you don't believe me - which then of course begs the question over exactly whether or not this particular data (does it really matter what extra information is going to be collected because we all agree it is going way to far already)is going to be offered to those same agencies and sold to reduce government debt?

MMMmm. Just a few other questions come to mind. Like -

If the private corporation that houses the data is offered a contra deal to offset the costs by selling data sets such as
what websites (and how often) the people in your street commonly visit, or what streamed services you and your neighbors are most often watching, or whether or not you prefer one type of petrol over another, or if you are a voter of one political party or another?? If that private corporation was to be a corporation that was allowed to be part of a media conglomerate with it's major shareholder who holds partisan political views? Would that be something that would be legislated against when data collection starts to collect every bit of personal data that is transmitted between us and every other corporate entity?

I wonder.

A point on metadata inaccuracies, the Government nor Opposition can elaborate on exactly what is or isn't 'metadata' and detail exactly what will or won't be 'retained for two years' because it is a technical fact all data transmitted between Tx/Rx is metadata.
Retention of all 'metadata' therefore is just the first necessary step in the process to making metadata storable and accessible for future uses. Mainly for future data-mining and data matching purposes for down stream users both Government and commercial operators.
The retention, categorization and cataloging for efficient indexing and archiving allowing ease of future access of large data sets, will allow the Government many commercial and legal opportunities to pursue. Such as national security,taxation and welfare fraud investigations, and provision of information to corporate and commercial operations for profit.
Governments or their pollsters, would also use it to gauge the response over a proposed policy announcement the same way commercial organisations currently data-mine user information for responses to consumer advertisements and 'sales campaigns'.
Collection of the 'metadata' will also allow it to on-sell that information for profit to debt collection agencies, credit reporting agencies, fine collections, court order servicing, monitoring of Court Orders, perhaps even to corporations wanting to influence the popular opinion and the outcome of an election......