Joseph Hartvigsen wrote: > > So what this comes down to is that we said to Ron if we are going to > sell you just a few plastic spoons so that you can copy them, we > request that you pay a royalty on the copies that you sell. His > watermoter with the plastic blue spoons sells on his web site for 480 > USD (plus shipping), I was charging him 40 USD (no markup at all) for > a set of the plastic spoons. His watermotor with the copied orange > spoons sells for 695 USD (plus shipping), the royalty would have been > 32 USD. > > Somehow the idea of paying a design royalty on direct physical copies > offends him, and he feels that the design should be public domain. We > aren't talking about the general concept of a turgo runner - which is > public domain, we're talking about a copy made by a rubber mold > directly around one of the plastic parts we provided him. He is free > like anyone else to sit down at a CAD system to design a part and > email the file to a mold maker who can use CAM software to machine the > mold. > ... > > Again, this is not an issue that I'm raising, but since Ron has raised > it in public, I'll address it in public. You can draw your own > conclusions. > > Joe
Joe has presented in detail the moral case. Whilst I have no wish to disagree with any of his specific points, there is a pragmatic [or if you like a "business" case] that runs in parallel with the moral one and this needs to be articulated as well. If a royalty is being claimed, then this comes with a price - an administrative price and a policing price. So let's do a cost benefit analysis and see whether it is worth it. If only a handful of units or at most a few tens of units are sold per year and the product is easily copied because it uses only low or intermediate level technology then I suggest it is hardly worth it. If volumes were much greater then the situation would be different, with the original craftsman being prepared to expend a lot of time and money on policing unauthorized copying, whilst would be copiers look for ways to slightly but sufficiently change the product so that royalty can be avoided. This sort of thing happens in the commercial world all the time. One approach (although not applicable to Turgo spoons) is to engineer a product so that full functionality depends on at least one high tech or high skill component. This doesn't have to be piece of hardware although it can be, for example, a custom micro chip, that is difficult to reverse engineer. Planetary Power is now finding itself in a similar position to that of Joe's. We have opted for the "at least one high tech or high skill component" approach. Recently we were paid a substantial sum of money for professional services relating to a micro-hydro site located several thousand kilometres outside of Australia where we are based. The job came about as a direct result of us featuring on our website our Banki-crossflow micro-hydro systems designed for low heads. It is now only a matter of time before sooner or later some of these turbines will find their way into that country. We have decided not to try and restrict or control our product being copied. On the contrary, we would welcome it. Our approach is to explain that no two low head sites are exactly the same and a successful micro-hydro implementation is more than just a turbine. It's the "more" that we are interested in. Eventually they may Regards, Max Enfield Planetary Power ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Get fast access to your favorite Yahoo! Groups. Make Yahoo! your home page http://us.click.yahoo.com/dpRU5A/wUILAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Does your company feature in the microhydro business directory at http://microhydropower.net/directory ? If not, please register free of charge and be exposed to the microhydro community world wide! NOTE: The advertisements in this email are added by Yahoogroups who provides us with free email group services. The microhydro-group does not endorse products or support the advertisements in any way. More information on micro hydropower at http://microhydropower.net To unsubscribe: send empty message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/microhydro/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
