"Yes, well, that's the sort of blinkered, philistine pig ignorance I've come to expect from you non-creative garbage."
In all of the discussions about copyright and patents, the ranters all seem to assume that ideas float freely and all anyone needs to do is fire up the machines to produce the widgets or code it up. They neglect the fact that someone had to spend (usually a lot) of time (and often money) to conceive, test, refine and _then_ produce the book, game, widget, etc. And with all of that investment there was no guarantee that it would succeed.
As soon as printing presses were around, it became clear that there are plenty of assholes who will wait to the very end of that process and simply copy a popular product, selling it cheaper because they had to take no risks. And plenty of people willing to save a buck by buying the knockoff.
Nobody would care if you came up with new bread shapes unless they somehow made eating bread even more wonderful. Despite the hours/weeks/years you spent toiling, your bread would be copied and you would never be able to recoup those costs.
I don't think that perpetual copyright is the answer, but neither is vilifying everyone who comes up with an original idea and wishing they would go out of business because Joe down the street was able to copy them in a week and sell it to you for half the price.