What are your questions on downloading & copying music legally?

Derivative

esuhl wrote: »

But laws that permit pharmaceutical companies to patent drugs and charge hundreds of pounds for ingredients that cost pence to manufacture, condemning the poor to an un-necessary death certainly don't make much sense to me.

Without patents, R&D for new drugs would be strictly limited to research grants only. Drugs don't discover and test themselves, sadly.

asbokid

There is a happy median..

Patents have expiry dates, after which generics can be produced and sold at much lower costs.

The expiry dates for drug patents are calculated to allow a company to recoup its R&D costs, and to return a profit to shareholders.

The expiry dates are set by government regulators. The notion of the unfettered free market has already been breached.

The patent expiry dates are arbitrary and many drug companies make obscene profits at the expense of public health and, in the case of the NHS, at the expense of public finances.

Drug companies lobby corrupt governments to extend their patents, to extend their profit season. A patent life of seven years is typical.

New drugs should be limited to very short patents, of perhaps just two years. That should allow the manufacturer to recoup its costs, together with a modest margin of profit.

After that time, the synthesis and sale of the drug should be open to any company.

moneysaverboy

What happened to the rep who was going to be answering all these questions - and if it exists where is the info please? I'd be very interested in reading what they had to say, but I can't see anywhere where it says where this has been published (if it has).

Cheers