Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Copy Right or Right to Copy?


In India copyright is respected for the "right to copy". You show anything. And Indians can copy it, and deliver it cheap. Machines, machine guns, computers, dumpers, rockets, sockets, medicines or kerosene.... Say anything. And they have it copied. Walk the streets along Esplanade or College Street in Kolkata. Every book that you can buy for US $ 20 can be purchased for 200 rupees (less than 5 dollars). The Indians have been fighting for reducing the protection period allotted for intellectual property rights and copy rights. Today, two US visitors to Kolkata were saying about abominably high medical costs in India, saying that people can run into bankruptcy due to medical bills. The lady in the team was speaking of a medium cost pacemaker that cost one of her relatives 122,000 US dollars, excluding other expenses! This sort of abnormality must be removed. If people cannot get medical services at affordable price, whichever generation you are in, and whichever economy you are in, you are walking to your grave. No wonder the Indians are upset with "nonreplicable" forms of seeds, medicines and instruments. Longlive copycats!

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