Lemley, Mark --- "IP in a world without scarcity" [2019] ELECD 254; in Mendis, Dinusha; Lemley, Mark; Rimmer, Matthew (eds), "3D Printing and Beyond" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2019) 30

Book Title: 3D Printing and Beyond

Editor(s): Mendis, Dinusha; Lemley, Mark; Rimmer, Matthew

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN: 9781786434043

Section: Chapter 1

Section Title: IP in a world without scarcity

Author(s): Lemley, Mark

Number of pages: 25

Abstract/Description:

3D printing shares two essential characteristics with the Internet: it radically reduces the cost of production and distribution of things, and it separates the design of those things from their manufacture. The role of IP in 3D printing is both controverted and critically important. IP rights are designed to artificially replicate scarcity where it would not otherwise exist. It makes ideas scarce because then we can bring them into the economy and charge for them, and economics knows how to deal with scarce things. Far from necessitating more IP protection, cost-reducing technologies may actually weaken the case for IP. If people are intrinsically motivated to create (as they seem to be), the easier it is to create and distribute content, the more content is likely to be available even in the absence of IP. And the point of IP is to encourage either the creation or the distribution of that content.