Ideas y protección

Al parecer, hoy se celebra el World Intellectual Property Day, con el peligroso lema en el póster Intellectual Property. It starts with an idea. Para quien le pille desprevenido, la propiedad intelectual en español abarca sólo los derechos de autor (en el poster se equivocan).

Como comentario al lema tan ambiguo, sirve la declaración del director general de la Organización Mundial de la Propiedad Intelectual (así dicen llamarse), Kamil Idris:

World Intellectual Property Day is an opportunity to encourage people to think about the role played by intellectual property in everyday life, and about its importance in stimulating and safeguarding innovation and creativity. This year we celebrate the starting point of all intellectual property, the seeds from which all innovations and creative works grow – ideas.

Mankind’s inexhaustible capacity for producing ideas makes us unique. Yet this extraordinary ability is often taken for granted. We hardly notice the countless ideas we generate every day, or how much of what we value is the fruit of others’ ideas: labor-saving inventions, pleasing designs, life-saving technologies.

Ideas shape our world. They are the raw materials on which our future prosperity and heritage depend. This is why it is important to provide environments in which innovative ideas are encouraged and rewarded. This is why intellectual property exists.

From the words, music and images which move us, to the brands which attract us; from the bicycle to bio-fuel; from the microchip to mobile phone – it all starts with an idea.

Me temo que Idris se equivoca. La protección intelectual o industrial no protege nunca ideas. Es muy sencillo, si protegemos las ideas, impediremos a otros pensar e innovar.