I agree that reasoned and clear debate is the best approach. I've tried to make the case 'pro' by citing the impact of PageRank/MapReduce/GFS, and suggesting t

I agree that reasoned and clear debate is the best approach. I've tried to make the case 'pro' by citing the impact of PageRank/MapReduce/GFS, and suggesting that the impact is no less than reshaping the way we think about computing. So what are the (non-anecdotal) examples of the costs? It's also important to put those costs into context, because everything has negative unintended consequences in the real world. What's the total annual expenditure on patent litigation benchmarked against (for example) medical malpractice cases? Which companies have been shut down by patent trolls benchmarked against (for example) the companies shut down by new environmental legislation? Which inventions are available on some platforms and not others (e.g. ClearType), and what's the productivity cost of them benchmarked against (say) not pursuing remedies against the Microsoft monopoly?