Patents are very different to copyrights. At the most fundamental level patents are registered and paid for. Copyrights are immediate and automatic.

So the suggestion is to make copyrights like patents, because, that system has proved to work so well?

Another difference is scale. Every photo you take is copyrighted to you. Immediately. For free. You're suggesting that every photo you take should incur a registration fee? Or that every photo everyone takes should be in the public domain?