2 ms·

and yet somehow we have more technical innovation now than we ever did outside of a patent system. there is a lot of emotional and assertive speculation around

and yet somehow we have more technical innovation now than we ever did outside of a patent system. there is a lot of emotional and assertive speculation around this issue but all of the hard facts that are available very strongly suggest patents work despite occasional (if highly publicized) conflict. how does your theory accommodate that fact?

CamperBob2 11y ago
Counterexample: how did the Internet and WWW ever evolve without a significant reliance on patents? How did the software industry in general ever flourish? The best we can say from empirical observation is that patents don't lead to guaranteed failure. We certainly can't say they're necessary. If everything that could have been patented was patented, we'd all be poorer for it. Except the lawyers, of course.