From: Joe Barr 

http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/0,14179,2914132,00.html


 Another SCO tool of obfuscation is the term "intellectual property." This
 fashionable but foolish term carries an evident bias: that the right way
 to treat works, ideas, and names is as a kind of property. Less evident
 is the harm it does by inciting simplistic thinking: it lumps together
 diverse laws--copyright law, patent law, trademark law and others--which
 really have little in common. This leads people to suppose those laws are
 one single issue, the "intellectual property issue," and think about
 "it"--which means, to think at such a broad abstract level that the
 specific social issues raised by these various laws are not even visible.
 Any "opinion about intellectual property" is thus bound to be foolish.
 (See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html.)

 In the hands of a propagandist for increased copyright or patent powers,
 the term is a way to prevent clear thinking. In the hands of someone
 making threats, the term is a tool for obfuscation: "We claim we can sue
 you over something, but we won't say what it is."


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