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Yet that also makes it so that innovation requires permission from your competitors, which is stifling.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
CalChris 9y ago
No. It isn’t stifling at all. This is Patent 101. Joe has a patent on the widget. I can’t make a widget without violating his patent. I get a patent on an improved widget. Joe can’t manufacture the improvement. He’s incented to cooperate with me and I’m incented to innovate. Incented, not stifled. Just allowing copying incents manufacture but not innovation. Even China is moving in the IP direction.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Joe has a patent on the widget. You can't make an improved widget without either getting permission from Joe, or breaking patent law. So you don't invent your improved widget, you don't patent it, and if Joe is not interested in innovating, nobody else won't do it either. The world becomes poorer. (In reality: enter China, who doesn't give a fuck and innovates anyway.) (In real reality: unfortunately, the Chinese government is starting to enforce western IP more and more, due to economical pressures from the west.)
  - CalChris 9y ago
    You might not invent the improved widget but I would. Essentially all patents are improvements. Berkeley invents CRISPR. Broad Institute invents improved CRISPR. In a parallel universe, does John Galt invent CRISPR? Let's see. He'd have to spend millions on development and then wouldn't be able to recoup that because anyone could copy it. So no, Galt doesn't do this. He's free to do this but there's no incentive for him to do it. Galt's world seems more like: From each according to their ability To each according to their need
  - bsbechtel 9y ago
    That's now how IP law works. If you invent material improvements on prior art, you are entitled to a patent as well, so long as you can articulate the material differences to the patent office.
- pjc50 9y ago
  This isn't how technology works any more. It's _extremely_ hard to make e.g. video codec that doesn't use patented techniques. What happens for things like that is the invention is a new technique, that gets rolled up with all the existing techniques and released in the next version of MPEG. Licensees pay MPEG-LA and it disburses to the members. Similar for chip design techniques, online stores and so on. Then there's network effects. If you build a better class of phone, do you have to build out a whole new non-interoperable phone network in order to get it deployed?

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

No. It isn’t stifling at all. This is Patent 101. Joe has a patent on the widget. I can’t make a widget without violating his patent. I get a patent on an improved widget. Joe can’t manufacture the improvement. He’s incented to cooperate with me and I’m incented to innovate. Incented, not stifled. Just allowing copying incents manufacture but not innovation. Even China is moving in the IP direction.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
Joe has a patent on the widget. You can't make an improved widget without either getting permission from Joe, or breaking patent law. So you don't invent your improved widget, you don't patent it, and if Joe is not interested in innovating, nobody else won't do it either. The world becomes poorer. (In reality: enter China, who doesn't give a fuck and innovates anyway.) (In real reality: unfortunately, the Chinese government is starting to enforce western IP more and more, due to economical pressures from the west.)
- CalChris 9y ago
  You might not invent the improved widget but I would. Essentially all patents are improvements. Berkeley invents CRISPR. Broad Institute invents improved CRISPR. In a parallel universe, does John Galt invent CRISPR? Let's see. He'd have to spend millions on development and then wouldn't be able to recoup that because anyone could copy it. So no, Galt doesn't do this. He's free to do this but there's no incentive for him to do it. Galt's world seems more like: From each according to their ability To each according to their need
- bsbechtel 9y ago
  That's now how IP law works. If you invent material improvements on prior art, you are entitled to a patent as well, so long as you can articulate the material differences to the patent office.
pjc50 9y ago
This isn't how technology works any more. It's _extremely_ hard to make e.g. video codec that doesn't use patented techniques. What happens for things like that is the invention is a new technique, that gets rolled up with all the existing techniques and released in the next version of MPEG. Licensees pay MPEG-LA and it disburses to the members. Similar for chip design techniques, online stores and so on. Then there's network effects. If you build a better class of phone, do you have to build out a whole new non-interoperable phone network in order to get it deployed?