Por qué los EE.UU. se hicieron tan ricos

De un artículo de Advogato sobre licencias abiertas de publicación, cito este comentario:

The US created its industrial revolution on "stolen" British patents, and US industrialists got their start by smuggling machinery out of Britain (since patents had no force, the British tried to protect their technical lead by forbidding exports of some types of equipment, and in some circumstances engineers and other technical experts weren’t allowed to leave the country).

US had been forced to comply with current international law (the GATT and other treaties and trade agreements), the country would have remained backward (ok, I hear sniggering from our British friends) and agricultural for far longer, a colony forced to buy its technology from Europe. In short, the US got to its current competitive position in the world by means of what is now called piracy.

Irónico, ¿no? Con todas las leyes DMCA, UCITA y etceterá, deberían notar el daño que se hacen.