Two Chinese students, entrepreneurs designing a start-up involving software and products linked to an Internet website to be developed and distributed in China, had to come up with a realistic business plan projection a couple of years ago. It required an estimation of the share of potential revenues that would be siphoned off by others appropriating the students' ideas. They decided that 60 percent would be a realistic loss rate—a stark reminder of the perils of owning intellectual property in China at that time.
Turning to the Internet itself, and particularly to content-sharing sites, the matter of ownership is challenged in a different way. Content produced by news media as well as individuals acting as professionals or amateurs is being copied, spliced, and represented essentially as something so new and unique that it is often downloaded by hundreds of thousands of viewers who might not have watched the original material. Who owns the result? Does anyone owe others for the use of the content? If so, how much and for what share? Or has the culture of "free" become so deeply imbedded in the minds of a new generation of users that content developers can only hope for partial, occasional, or eventual financial rewards for their efforts?
This brings to mind some aspects of the way that the Internet facilitates cooperation in the generation of intellectual capital ranging from new product development to research. It helps explain why the Gen Xers we discussed several months ago find it quite natural to work in teams, either in face-to-face contact or online. In some cases, it is producing remarkable results. But whose work is it? Who owns the result?
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