[dumbneurologist]

> The system was put in place to protect us

That's a little bit overly generous.

It was put in place to incentivize invention and creation. But I think clear with examples like this that it's holding us back. There are so many people, and there is so much innovation, and so much ability to understand how something new works that these laws do nothing to help the public.

And even if they started with the public good in mind, we are now far from it.

As other responders are suggesting: scrap it completely, and see where things end up.

And even though we are discussing patents, the benefit to the public is ten times larger for copyright.

Copyright maximalists had a stroke of genius when they started calling it "intellectual property" and "IP rights". This allows you to make it a moral issue, rather than a public policy issue (which is what it really is).