An amazing column in the FT by James Boyle, A closed mind about an open world, where he coins a phrase ‘openness aversion’ to describe our tendency to undervalue the importance, viability and productive power of open systems, open networks and non-proprietary production. A must read:

It is not that openness is always right. Rather, it is that we need a balance between open and closed, owned and free, and we are systematically likely to get the balance wrong. Partly this is because we still do not understand the kind of property that exists on networks. Most of our experience is with tangible property; fields that can be overgrazed if outsiders cannot be excluded. For that kind of property, control makes more sense. We still do not intuitively grasp the kind of property that cannot be exhausted by overuse (think of a piece of software) and that can become more valuable to us the more it is used by others (think of a communications standard). There the threats are different, but so are the opportunities for productive sharing. Our intuitions, policies and business models misidentify both. Like astronauts brought up in gravity, our reflexes are poorly suited for free fall.

via JP who adds his bit also worth remembering:

Understanding why “we” undervalue these things is critical to the three big I-battles we face: Intellectual Property, Identity and the Internet.

It is not enough for those that “get it” to go into a mutual-admiration huddle and back-slapping frenzies, as we are often wont to do. Those that don’t get it don’t get it for a reason. The commonest reason is an inability to comprehend three apparently simple things: that people can be altruistic; that extreme nonrival goods can and do exist; that people can make money because-of-rather-than-with.

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