[bkmeneguello]

Patents do more harm than good. Ideas aren't scarce and obviously, this is abused by bad players to restrict competition. Doesn't make sense to restrict the right of someone to do a sequence of calculations on his own computer.

[martindbp]

I think patents are fine, but the criterion used to award them are strange.

We only need a simple criterion: absent this patent, would this technology have been invented anyway (within a reasonable timeframe)? Yes, then don't award a patent. It's a bit subjective, but so is "substantiality".

By this criterion, would a certain drug have been invented if it was not expected to receive a patent. That is usually a clear no. It takes a lot of money and resources to develop new drugs but little to copy, therefore companies would stop doing research altogether.

Another example, would e-ink displays have been invented if it was not rewarded a patent? Absolutely yes, by multiple independent parties probably, thus should not deserve a patent.

I don't think there is a single software patent that would pass this criterion.

[vel0city]

> absent this patent, would this technology have been invented anyway (within a reasonable timeframe)?

This would be the criteria of non-obviousness that already exists in US patent law. The problem is it seems like lots of patent agents seem to approve what lots of people "skilled in the art" would consider obvious (one-click checkout? shopping cart? really?!). Which then requires some level of litigation to have a lot of people "skilled in the art" to testify of the obviousness of the patent.

IMO a lot of these patent issues we see today could be solved if we had more patent agents and more skilled patent agents, but then we've got a ton of otherwise smart engineers and other kinds of people spending their days reviewing patents instead of actually making new things.

[robinsoh]

> Another example, would e-ink displays have been invented if it was not rewarded a patent? Absolutely yes, by multiple independent parties probably, thus should not deserve a patent.

Tell us, how exactly do you think e-ink displays work? Because everytime I hear someone say exactly what you've said above, I've asked them to explain it and you know what, they talk about the rotating ball gyricon which is Xerox PARC's patent, or they talk about microcapsules (often googling it as they try to respond to me). I like to be specific since I work in the display industry and if you look at my comment history you'll see how disappointed I am with the lack of actual understanding of the technologies involved and the blaise reference to patents without knowing anything about what's limiting progress in electrophoretics. In short, physics is what is limiting it.

[aunty_helen]

So you're suggesting that if there were no patents, drug companies would cease to exist?

That doesn't seem very likely.

[smitty1e]

Patents have the positive effect of rewarding risk to recoup development costs.

The 17yr patent clock ends up leaving a handful of years for a company to balance its books before expiry and the onslaught of generics.

Hence the ludicrous per-pill costs.

Those demonizing pharma have not done the homework.

Disclaimer: wife works in pharma.

[naasking]

I often demonize pharma because my partner works in that field. People in that field are often blind to its faults, like perverse incentive structures and Byzantine regulatory processes that often harm more than help. Pharma companies' R&D budget is dwarfed by its marketing and expenditures on financial games like stock buybacks, so this talk of recouping costs doesn't hold much water in my opinion.

If something is necessary but unprofitable in the near term, the early research is often already publically funded, like the mRNA vaccines.

[smitty1e]

> Byzantine regulatory processes that often harm more than help

Right. Regulation is to the economy as bandages to the mummy.

The incentives are deep and perverse.

[naasking]

The regulatory failures are numerous, and even recent examples are common:

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/when-will-the-fda-appr...

https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/adumbrations-of-aducan...

The FDA is simultaneously too lax and too strict.

[martindbp]

Mm, no, you're right. But they'd spend a lot less on research, they'd have to. I don't claim to know a lot about that industry so I may be wrong, it's just an example. Can't think of an example where patents are more defensible though.

[CWuestefeld]

False choice fallacies aren't helpful. Incentives change behavior at the margins. So if there were no patents, we'd like have fewer drugs.

[aunty_helen]

Yes I know, that's why I replied to:

>but little to copy, therefore companies would stop doing research altogether.

It's much more likely these companies would find a different incentives / business models.

[naasking]

> therefore companies would stop doing research altogether.

Don't discount first mover advantage.

[MattPalmer1086]

Would you say the concept of patents is inherently bad, or the current patent system?

Without some protection for original research being published, genuine inventors are forced to keep their ideas secret and/or find other ways to protect them.

[JPLeRouzic]

That's absolutely true for companies with deep pockets, but absolutely false for SME and lone inventors.

Nearly all big companies are involved in patent litigation, and unfortunately often it's and easy way to crush nascent competition.

[MattPalmer1086]

I agree the current system is deeply flawed. The question I want to address is how do we ensure original ideas are not lost to humanity (either because they are kept secret, or because the research is never done in the first place).

[JPLeRouzic]

> how do we ensure original ideas are not lost to humanity either because they are kept secret...

I understand what you mean but patents are not a good means for this goal.

I know a bit the patent world (I was granted 12 patents), patents are for small innovations. I am not even sure it's possible to patent some complex intellectual work, because a patent is basically the description of a process, not the description of knowledge.

There is little in common between a patent and a scientific article which conveys much more information. Yes, you can provide a lot information in the description section but they are not protected, only the claims are protected by law. Claims are either descriptive or describing a method to process something. After all patents were invented to protect things during the industrial revolution, essentially bolts, nuts and new steam machines.

Another thing is that most inventors do not recognize their work once the patent engineers have translated it in legal language.

Sometimes in my case, the patent engineers did not understood at all what my colleagues and me meant, or they tried to make "improvements" indeed without the slightest knowledge about the application domain. What value have those patents to describe what was meant?

Most companies which have to reproduce a patent, have a hard time. Generic drugs companies tell it is impossible to reproduce drugs from the patent and they have to be helped by the inventors.

[MattPalmer1086]

Yes, I completely agree that the patent system has many flaws. I've worked on a couple of them myself and I recognise all your points.

My original question still stands though. Is there a better way of achieving this?

[JPLeRouzic]

> Is there a better way of achieving this?

I am not a lawyer but here are some random ideas: Societies have invented patents as an exception to a generic right to copy: Something which is patented must not be copied without authorization. They were also invented because copyright/brand name can't protect industrial objects which were often simple in design. So the innovation that patent laws brought was to protect the way something is working to reach some goal. Claim 1: This is a car toy equipped with rockets Claim 2: Where rockets uses water Claim 3: Where water is produced from thin air

There are possibly similar legal objects with similar goals. For example some companies sell their knowledge to government in exchange of keeping it secret. Why not imagine the reverse?

Could companies sell their knowledge to government in exchange of making it public? After all it's the interest of any government to make economy thrive and make non strategic knowledge to diffuse as quickly as possible.

This is the model used by IBM/Oracle/Redhat/etc: They sell something now almost trivial (OSes, DB, workflows) yet which needs an army of consultants to be production ready and conform to current legislation.

It's possible also to protect your product by the power of your brand. They were thousand manufacturers which tried producing pseudo iPhones but nearly nobody wants to buy one which would be obviously fake.

If companies prefer patents, it's because they don't like competition and it is easy to kill nascent competitors with an expensive trial.

[zozbot234]

> Without some protection for original research being published, genuine inventors are forced to keep their ideas secret and/or find other ways to protect them.

Publication of "secrets" and general know-how can be incented via post-facto prize awards. Unlike patents, these don't forbid anyone from making use of the innovation unless they pay up. They replace a focus on enforcement - with publication often a mere afterthought in practice - with one on publication itself.

[MattPalmer1086]

I do like the idea of prizes, they seem to work quite well for some well defined problems that needs solving.

I'm not sure they would prevent ideas being kept secret for most forms of commercial research though. Publicly funded research should be available to everyone in any case IMHO.

[slowmovintarget]

The concept of software patents is inherently bad. You're basically saying no one is allowed to write down the same idea as you.

[MattPalmer1086]

I agree that software patents are inherently bad, along with maths.

I still see a role for patents in other spheres, although the current system seems deeply flawed.

The main problem to be addressed in how we ensure society as a whole benefits from original research. The original conception of patents was to grant limited rights for original ideas, as long as the work is published and does not remain secret.

[Melatonic]

Not sure I agree with that completely but I do think our patent system needs to be updated and overhauled.

Everyone shits on China for stealing ideas but at the same time the general culture there does not have the same respect for the idea of patenting an idea - for better or worse.

Personally I think there is a nice middle ground between those two