盜版悖論：時尚設計中的創新與知識產權

The Piracy Paradox: Innovation and Intellectual Property in Fashion Design

知識產權的正統理由是功利主義。強知識產權權利的宣導者們認為，倘若缺乏這樣的權利，複製者將搭載創作者努力的便車，扼殺創新。但是，存在一個重要的經驗性反常現象：在缺乏強力知識產權保護的情形下，全球時尚產業依然製造出了花樣繁多的創意產品。企業對待複製的謙抑態度，與其他創意產業中對盜版的強烈譴責以及相關立法和訴訟活動形成鮮明對比。為何當其他主要的內容產業已經為其產品獲得日益強大的知識產權保護時，時尚設計依然多半不受保護，並在經濟上取得成功？我們認為，時尚產業反直覺地在一個弱知識產權平衡中運轉，複製非但未阻礙創新，反而可能在事實上促進了創新。我們將此稱為“盜版悖論”。本文提供了一個模型，解釋時尚產業的盜版悖論是如何運作的，以及複製如何在產業的快速創新週期中充當一個重要因素，甚至可能是一個必要基礎。就此，我們旨在闡明時裝產業的創造性動因。同時，我們希望引發知識產權政策基本問題的進一步探索：對激勵創新而言，何種程度的知識產權權利是必要的？穩定的弱知識產權平衡是否還存在於其他產業？

The orthodox justification for intellectual property is utilitarian. Advocates for strong IP rights argue that absent such rights copyists will free-ride on the efforts of creators and stifle innovation. Yet a significant empirical anomaly exists： the global fashion industry, which produces a huge variety of creative goods without strong IP protection. Firms’ attitude about copying stands in striking contrast to the heated condemnation of piracy and associated legislative and litigation campaigns in other creative industries. Why, when other major content industries have obtained increasingly powerful IP protections for their products, does fashion design remain mostly unprotected and economically successful? We argue that the fashion industry counter-intuitively operates within a low-IP equilibrium in which copying does not deter innovation and may actually promote it. We call this the piracy paradox. This paper offers a model explaining how the fashion industry’s piracy paradox works, and how copying functions as an important element of and perhaps even a necessary predicate to the industry’s swift cycle of innovation. In so doing, we aim to shed light on the creative dynamics of the apparel industry. But we also hope to spark further exploration of a fundamental question of IP policy： to what degree are IP rights necessary to induce innovation? Are stable low-IP equilibria imaginable in other industries as well?