[r00fus]

Any flat increase would just make it less likely that the big guys will have competition in their "most patents filed" competition.

Also, given we just switch from first-invented to first-filed, it is particularly onerous for those garage-based small inventors as a big corp can easily justify the cost.

What might make more sense is to tax intellectual property. We tax physical property with much less value than a "successful" software patent (ahem, Eolas?), why not tax the non-physical property as well? If you make it progressive based on the number of patents owned/controlled, it will also limit the usability of maintaining warchests of patents for controlling markets.

[darkarmani]

Perfect. Tax them heavier as they age. That way the people trying to create usable products are barely hurt, but by the last few years it costs a lot to hold on to. And you can release your patent to the public domain to release it. That's more likely to hit trolls than innovators.