[80ProofPudding]

What you said about the relationship between products and patents is true and worth adding to the discussion, fwiw.

I think making it an absolute - ie, there is never anything to learn along these lines - is going too far, but there are certainly a lot of patents that never see further development.

[timdierks]

It's a little bit of hyperbole, sure, but I don't recall ever seeing a press article that used a patent disclosure to offer any real insight about unreleased products. I'd be happy to see a counterexample.