Social Norms & Intellectual Property

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Passage

Passage A Comedians are not amused when their jokes are stolen, and for that reason we might expect joke-stealing disputes to ripen into lawsuits occasionally. Copyright is the most relevant body of law; formally, it applies to jokes and comedic routines. Yet copyright infringement lawsuits between rival comedians are all but unheard copyright law simply does not provide comedians with a cost-effective way of protecting their comedic material.

Conventional intellectual property wisdom holds that absent formal legal protection, there would be scant production of creative works, as potential creators would be deterred by the unlikelihood of recouping the cost of their creations. If there is no effective legal protection against comedians keep cranking out new material night after night?

The answer to this question is that, in stand-up comedy, social norms substitute for intellectual property law. Taken as a whole, this norms system governs a wide array of issues that generally parallel those ordered by copyright law. These norms are not merely hortatory. They are enforced with sanctions, including simple badmouthing use and transfer, impose sanctions on transgressors, and maintain substantial incentives to invest in new material.

Passage B Accomplished chefs consider their recipes to be a very valuable form of intellectual property. At the same time, recipes are not a form of innovation that is effectively covered by current intellectual property laws. Recipes are rarely patentable, and combinations of ingredients cannot be copyrighted. Legal protections are potentially available these norms function in a manner quite similar to law-based intellectual property systems.

First, a chef must not copy another chef’s recipe innovation exactly. The function of this norm is analogous to patenting in that the community acknowledges the right of a recipe inventor to exclude others from practicing his or her invention, even if all the information required to do so is publicly available. as the authors of that information. This norm operates in a manner analogous to copyright protection.

What this question is testing

Analogy

Your task

Pin down exactly what the question asks about the passage — a detail, the author's view, the structure, or the main point — before looking at the choices.

Common trap

Answers that restate a true detail from the passage but don't answer the specific question being asked.

Winning move

Anticipate the answer in your own words from the passage, then find the choice that matches that prediction.

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The question

18.

The relationship described in passage A as holding between comedians and copyright law is most analogous to the relationship described in passage B as holding between chefs and

Answer choices

Bad Match16% picked this
intellectual
Intellectual property is intellectual property in both passages. For comedians the IP is jokes and routines, and for chefs the IP is recipes. Comedians could protect their IP with copyright law, but seldom do. Chefs could protect their IP with trade secrecy law, but seldom do.
16%
Weak Match12% picked this
patent
This is the second best answer, since we are told that recipes are rarely patentable, so maybe sometimes patent law could protect chefs the way that copyright law can protect comedians. But it sounds like copyright law is actually an available remedy (not practically, but legally) for comedians and that trade secrecy law is actually an available remedy for chefs. And the fact that we're told that chefs seldom use trade secrecy protections matches up with being told that comedians almost never use copyright protections. There's no corresponding line like that for patent law.
12%
Bad Match2% picked this
the combinations of ingredients in a
The combinations of ingredients in a recipe is part of the specific intellectual property chefs are trying to protect. The setups and punchlines in a comedy routine are part of the specific intellectual property comedians are trying to protect. Combinations of ingredients = setups and punchlines and word choice of jokes
2%
Correct68% picked this
trade secrecy
Why this is right
Just as copyright law offers comedians protection (even though they almost never use it), so trade secrecy law offers chefs protection (even though they seldom use it).
Skill tested: Analogy · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.
68%
Bad Match3% picked this
social
Social norms = social norms, for both passages. Both comedians and chefs have intellectual property they want to protect. Both of them eschew the legal means available (copyright / trade secrecy law), and instead they both use social norms to protect their IP.
3%

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