By progress do you mean creation of new technology or making technology available? A case I followed (involving infringement on a fingerprint recognition paten

By progress do you mean creation of new technology or making technology available? A case I followed (involving infringement on a fingerprint recognition patent) shows how even weak patents slow the development process. Summary - Small company receives patent, sues large companies for infringement, two years and more than a million dollars later patent is invalidated, technology moves on. All the gory details here: http://www.legalmetric.com/cases/patent/utd/utd_206cv00115.html http://www.legalmetric.com/cases/patent/utd/utd_206cv00115.h...