The free software movement (Richard Stallman, the GNU Project, the Free Software Foundation, etc.) claims that intellectual property is a bit of a contradiction in terms. They argue that information wants to be free and restricting use, distribution or development of digital goods such as software is a violation of its purposes and principles.
As these "goods" can be copied almost infinitely often one might ask: why constrain access to these goods that are already virtually a common good? But then, one also has to ask: what is it about material wealth that makes it right, without alternative even, to treat it as private property? Most proponents of free software and of intellectual property rights reforms distinguish between "intellectual property law" and your run-of-the-mill property law; they oppose the former but appreciate the latter. In contrast to this, we want to ask how well founded the proclaimed distinction between "intellectual" and material property is.