It is also a wealth transfer from the poor to the wealthy: the justice system protecting IP capital is financed by taxpayers, the hard majority of which hold no patents.
Disney making billions off Mickey Mouse? They can pay a tiny fraction of that and they can have their extension.
Novel by obscure dead author? Don't extend the copyright unless the estate wants to pay for it.
Abandoned and nobody to pay the tax? Enters the public domain.
All those defensive spurious patents? They impose a search cost on every single other innovator. There should be a carrying cost for the defensive patent wall.
The tax on this value could scale from 1% for year 10 onwards, increasing by 0.25% per year. Year 50 of your copyright? Be prepared to pay 11% APR rent on its value.
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/10/06/a-closer-loo...
Patents are government-enforced monopolies. They enable all of what anyone would expect with monopolies, namely high prices for consumers.
If you've ever tried to read a patent, you'll know this system has failed. In almost no cases can you meaningfully replicate an invention from a patent. Quite apart from which, a huge number of things under patent protection today are public knowledge anyway, or can be considered 'obvious'.
Ive never been satisfied with this necessity; its not like innovation would just seize without patents: innovation in processes is still incentivized, because falling behind would mean higher prices than competition, and lost market share, so you still need to r&d to at least match the competition, let alone best it. Innovation in consumer products is still incentivized, by first movers effect, though perhaps the easiest copied things are lost (ie plastic lids might be too easy to copy design updates). Innovation in software obviously wont stop, and shenzhen succeeds in electronics with lax (absent?) patent/copyright law.
The primary innovation patents might be necessary for is a small company taking on a larger one, and needing to protect its design while it gets itself going.... but in practice, it proposed hinders innovation there more than it helps.
Patents, I think, are about essentially open-sourcing the design of things, and the incentive to do so is a temporary, gov-enforced monopoly. If theres any idea about innovation, its in the long-term, as 5,10,20 years from now, we can read up on these ideas and build on top of them, instead of seeing them lost in time with the company's demise.
However I never found that argument to be believable. Big companies have such a vast patents portfolio that it's impossible for small companies that try to create a product to not infringe on anything. So what happens many times in practice are actually cross-licensing deals.
Therefore small companies developing some innovative algorithm or technology are better off keeping it a trade secret until launch.
In the real world, open source and open research communities have no shortage of innovation, even without being able to place artificial blocks on the competition. It turns out, creator's motivations are more complicated than making money alone.
In my opinion, innovation might move a bit slower without the money injections from VCs who can be confident they can get patents and a safe ROI, but I think we'd be better off in the long run if we allowed creators to build off past ideas without the fear of being sued.
I don't disagree. I look at it as a way for me to profit, I have to be pragmatic, unfortunately. I do donate 25% of each bonus to the EFF and personally I look at it another way...
This problem is going to get worse before it gets better. If I don't do this someone else will. The powers that be want this, and the lower levels like myself live on a bounty. It'll eventually fix itself, but until then I can net enough money to pay off my student loans, my cars, my house.
That said, my employer has filed a patent for some work I did for them, and it’s a tough issue for me. In this case, I don’t think the innovation is so world changing that I need to fight for it to be open, nor do I think they would honor my desire to leave it unpatented as I’m not really in a position to ask for that.
But it’s an issue I feel uncomfortable with, and I kind of dream of moving to a different place where my employer doesn’t try to patent my work.
It is tough when they offer you a few thousand for these ideas you come up with. That money could help me build a family, but in closing off these ideas I’m making it harder for everyone else to prosper.
FWIW, if anyone says “patents encourage innovation” I would ask you for citations. I understand this is the story we’re told, but it’s typically presented with simple anecdotal evidence and hunches. I’ve never seen a thorough study of the issue.