Again, there is not much overwhelming empirical evidence that software / tech are harmed by patents. Studies attempting to prove this have been sorely lacking.

Again, there is not much overwhelming empirical evidence that software / tech are harmed by patents. Studies attempting to prove this have been sorely lacking. However, there was a recent study that showed that patents can be a slight drag on fields characterized by a large number of very small, incremental improvements, which can characterize a lot of software innovations. I cannot find it right now, but this was the first paper I found that actually tries to quantify the costs of patents to industries like ours. On the other hand, there are multiple other studies showing how having a patent increases the chances of tech startups of a) receiving VC funding and b) making successful exits. I'd say it's still not clear that the software industry is being harmed more by patents than it is being benefited.