[crakenzak]

> leading to an estimated average increase of 17,000 to 29,000 more patents each year

Insane to me that they use this as a measure of innovation, when almost by definition it is the antithesis of innovation.

[adastra22]

What definition is that? Because the legal definition of patent I’m familiar with requires each patent to be a unique innovation.

[colinsane]

a patent is a legal restriction affecting what others are allowed to produce. a person/group hit by such a restriction may elect to not produce the (innovative) thing they otherwise would have.

so that's the viewpoint in which patents may be "the antithesis to innovation". i won't argue which one's correct, just providing it here since you requested.

[devbent]

Patents also require disclosure of how something is done, and the history of innovation in the Western world has been one of iterative improvements on patented inventions so as to be granted a new patent.

Software arguably is not suited for a patent system, but patents have worked well for centuries.

[chrismcb]

So... yeah a patent restricts what others can produce. But parents are supposed to be for things that are novel, which means if it's unlikely for someone else to produce it to begin with. Parents are supposed to help encourage people to innovate. I do think to many patents are given and many aren't novel enough. But I do believe, at least historically, they led to innovations. I also don't think software works be patentable

[naasking]

That fewer patents are filed is not evidence that fewer innovations are taking place. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

[amalcon]

That fewer patents are filed is not an absence of evidence. It's evidence that fewer patents are being filed. If one believes patent filings are correlated with innovation (which is debatable either way), then it is (non-probative but still significant) evidence that fewer innovations are taking place.

[naasking]

> If one believes patent filings are correlated with innovation

This is exactly the claim I'm taking issue with. The OP implied that the legal definition of innovation was "patents filed" and implied that this is somehow meaningful, and I'm saying that the absence of patents is not evidence of a lack of innovation.

[vkou]

What objective metric would you recommend they use, instead?

[ClumsyPilot]

Productivity improvement in a physical application - it now takes fewer people less time to build a house

It takes less resources to remedy a failed over bridge. You’d have to have a basket of measurement like how we measure CPI - current approach is lazy.

[BobaFloutist]

What if an innovation makes things better, instead of faster?

The house takes just as long to build, but it's sturdier, longer lasting, better insulated, etc?

[ClumsyPilot]

Well those are all measurable quantities, and you can measure them in proportion to their economic importance - like house insulation is a big change if you live in cold climate, etc.

I am not saying it’s easy, but economics is full of complex measurements, financial derivatives, and god knows what. Maybe they should spend some effort measuring the real world.

[NominalNews]

Without opining on the validity of the overall patent count as a measure of creativity, here's a cool paper I saw describing how to determine 'creative patents' - https://raw.githubusercontent.com/aakashkalyani/WebsiteUploa...