A moral question

                                A Moral Question

It's still too cold to work outside and I have been having a moral debate
with myself for months about an issue I would like to bring up. I'd like to
see what the collective wisdom might be.

 I have always thought that the hybridizer of hostas made little money on
all of the effort that he/she put in the the process. I think that the
TC-ing of so many hostas has added another dimension to that problem.
Selling OS for two or three years is no longer a really viable auction. A
lot of plants  (those without patents) cab be TC ed without permission or
offering the original hybridizer a red cent. I am sure that there is an
argument about Capitalistic Darwinism out there when I say that.  OK..let
me assume that this reality is already understood if not forgiven. At least
on this issue, it might be nice if there was a gentlemen's agreement that
unauthorized TC of recent hostas on the market would be given a 3 or 4 year
period where the hybridizer and  TC agent might be allowed to make their
profit on time and materials. Then after this period , the plant would be
open to all. A bit like the time of a copywrite on a book may last (only I
think that might be decades and can be renewed). Of course such agreements,
without the tooth of the law behind them are not exactly enforceable.

So I have been wondering what would happen if a hybridizer and a TC agent
worked out a deal  whereby THE hybridizer  would sanction the use of a
phrase like: THIS PLANT IS AUTHORIZED FOR SALE BY THE HYBRIDIZER. And the
vendors buying these plants would all have these labels for each of these
plants. I am not talking about the AHS creating such an label, but the
hybridizer him/herself. There is no force of law there, but there might be
a moral consideration which could make some  difference. There might be
another advantage too. Perhaps this connection between the TC agent and the
hybridizer might be more of a guarantee that those TCs bearing this label
would be much closer to the originator's stock which was used to produce
the TC.  I am still convinced that much of the TC world is selling plants
that are not exactly twins of the original.

Just an idea on wintry March day.

"History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes.""Even a lie is a psychic
fact." -Carl Jung, psychiatrist (1875-1961)

Glen Williams
20 Dewey St.
Springfield , Vermont
05156
Tel: 802-885-2839 

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