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The e-ink patent is so frustrating. Another good example of a patent restricting innovation was the patent on 3D Printers. That's why in the past few years, 3D

The e-ink patent is so frustrating. Another good example of a patent restricting innovation was the patent on 3D Printers. That's why in the past few years, 3D printers have become so much more prevalent and accessible (you can buy one for a few hundred dollars today). These definitely stifle innovation. I'd think a more reasonable approach could be, you have a patent for 15 years (or whatever arbitrary number is reasonable) or until the patent holder makes some multiple dollar amount from things that use whatever is patented. That is, if it costs a million dollars to develop e-ink screens, the patent is valid until the company has had revenue of 20 million dollars on devices that have e-ink screens. Tying it to revenue instead of profit is intended since profits can be turned into revenue easily to bypass the restriction otherwise. You could also add a minimum number of years (obviously less than the max mentioned above) so companies have some protection across various metrics.

pclmulqdq 5y ago
In the EU, patents have escalating fees. They don't escalate very fast, but I think this would help with innovation a lot. IMO the first ~4 years can cost a few thousand dollars (so you can get your startup up and running), but the 20th year of a patent should escalate to several hundred thousand or million dollars. That way, building a long-lived "patent fence" becomes economically infeasible the way it is today.
- chongli 5y ago
  Economically infeasible for NPEs, sure, but still a rounding error for Big Tech. The issue with schemes that make it difficult for NPEs is that they hurt the small inventor who cannot afford to capitalize their invention. Owners of capital may be able to form a monopsony to drive down the price of patent licenses and essentially squeeze out small inventors.
  - motives 5y ago
    Just as an example, IBM receives almost 10,000 patents a year. At $100,000-$1,000,000 per patent, that year of patents alone in 15-20 years time would cost $1-10 billion. That is most definitely not a rounding error and would constitute as much as 10% of their annual revenue just to keep that single years worth of patents. I think this sort of escalating pricing scheme would definitely help reduce the barriers for startups and new innovators, and prevent abuse by companies worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
  - InspiredIdiot 5y ago
    Escalating fees still seems like a great way to limit the damage to small investors while turning the screws on NPEs, though. If the owners of capital can form this monopsony hurting small investors in the escalating fees case wouldn't they be able to do the same in the constant fee case? Is the proposition that they would be able to keep the monopsony together better with a bigger incentive (avoiding potentially high patent fees once they escalate)? It seems to me that yes it doesn't do much to reduce the use of patents by Big Tech that they are actually commercializing. It would be nice to solve all the problems but it seems like it solves some of the problems that almost everyone but NPEs can agree on in a neat way without too much collateral damage.
    - chongli 5y ago
      Big Tech can afford to spend billions on patent moats for no other reason than to suffocate any small businesses that cannot raise enough capital to pull their heads above the water. An escalating fee scheme, while not wholly responsible for the problem, seems like it adds to it. It’s yet another barrier to entry that contributes to the enormous failure rate of startups.
      - visualradio 5y ago
        Well suppose the valuation mechanism for determining the relative value of patents that the escalating fees were levied upon was implemented by requiring IP holders to declare the price at which they were willing to permanently release the discovery into the public domain in exchange for a one-time payment. The result of such a scheme might be that is nearly always cheaper to pay the patent office to permanently destroy your competitor's patents and release the discovery into the public domain for everyone then it is to hire lawyers to go to court with your competitor in order to obtain a settlement and mutual licensing agreement. So whenever large tech companies have disputes with each other they might start destroying each other's patent arsenals rather than going to court, which would level the playing field for everyone else. And if a large number of smaller startups were being harassed by a large company they could crowd source the money needed to pay the patent office to destroy the large firm's patents without spending any money on lawyers or legal fees and without having to halt development.
  - Wowfunhappy 5y ago
    They might be able to afford it, but money is money. The question would be whether the cost of keeping the patent outweighs its potential profits.
    - visualradio 5y ago
      The question should be how do we eliminate unnecessary transaction costs and overheads associated with license negotiations, legal fees, and courts costs, and ensure new public inventions can be immediately manufactured by a large number of domestic firms before they are knocked off by foreign manufacturers uninterested in obtaining licenses, while still compensating the original inventor? A possible solution is to require the patent filers to declare the price at which they are willing to permanently release the invention into the public domain in exchange for a one time payment. Then if someone is sued for IP violation the defendant can crowd-source the inventor's fee and pay it through the patent office to have the the patent destroyed immediately without hiring lawyers or halt production. The IP registrar could then levy a quarterly maintenance tax on the quit price filed by the IP holder to prevent the inventor's fee from being set infinitely high.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Andrex 5y ago
  I like the idea but part of me thinks that would just benefit the companies doing well and hurt companies not doing well, potentially affecting competition.
- rbjorklin 5y ago
  Maybe combine this with a decreasing cap on royalties making patents less profitable over time?
PicassoCTs 5y ago
A exponential cost curve to hold a patent would fix that. Every year the cost increases, making it less interesting to hold "dead" patterns bringing in no revenue.
- delecti 5y ago
  That feels backwards. A patent nobody wants will be public domain. A patent that's actually stifling competition will stay protected. It'll at least cost money to stay protected, so it's not completely backwards, but I don't think this is the right approach.
- procombo 5y ago
  Bad idea for patents. The public is vastly benefitted by patent expiration. It's also why we can have generic drugs, etc. Now, exponential cost curve for _copyrights_ is interesting. And arguably already a thing... considering that Mickey Mouse is approaching 100 years old and is not yet in the public domain.
  - cogman10 5y ago
    I could see a combo approach. Ideally, I'd like to see tech patents see a sunset of something like 5 years. The current 20 year hold is bonkers. However, if we keep the 20 year lifetime, then having an exponential cost of ownership would serve to ward off patent trolling companies. They could still exist to some extent but their operational expenses would be a lot higher than they are now. It'd put a number of them out of business (or at very least free up a bunch of patents). The trick is coming up with good numbers here. Too low and you might as well not add it. Too high and you might as well eliminate patents all together as they've lost their original purpose (to protect the little inventor).
    - visualradio 5y ago
      With the proposal for continuously increasing maintenance fees on ownership it is necessary to establish some public mechanism for determining the relative value of patents upon which the the maintenance fees are levied. One possible solution is to require the IP holder to declare the quit price at which they are willing to abandon their claim and permanently release the discovery into the public domain prior to the expiration date of the patent in exchange for a one time payment. This should reduce legal fees and court costs. If a firm is notified of patent infringement and pending litigation, instead of hiring a lawyer and going to court and halting production, they could instead crowd source the funds to pay the quit price to the patent office. The patent office would then pay the original inventor and place the discovery into the public domain for everyone so that there was no basis for continuing legal action. When large tech companies have legal disputes, they might find that it is always cheaper to pay the patent office to immediately destroy each other's patent arsenals, which would also release all of the discoveries into the public domain and level the playing field for smaller firms as well. If someone is willing to pay the quit price to the original inventor there should be no problem with expiring patents which have been issued for less than 1 day. 1 business day would likely work fine as the minimum duration for patents.
Aspos 5y ago
Counterargument: I get a patent for a special-purpose shell company MegaCorpA, license the technology to MegaCorpB for $1, concentrate all the profits in MegaCorpB and thus MegaCorpA will get a perpetual patent. Tying patents to revenues of licensees does not work too, because any patent licensed to Samsung will instantly become void.
- jorgemf 5y ago
  >> Tying patents to revenues of licensees does not work too, because any patent licensed to Samsung will instantly become void. I don't see anything wrong with it. Other big companies will prefer to have Samsung as a partner instead as an enemy, and small companies will have very difficult to compete with samsung at scale. And if they do it is because they have done so many other things right, which it is great for consumers
  - Aspos 5y ago
    Yeah, but why LG would rush into paying for the license if the patent will become free as soon as Samsung will pay to license it first? Point is, the original idea of tying patents to revenues needs more thinking.
    - jorgemf 5y ago
      Because Samsung will use LG ideas too. As a company, I think, it is better to partner with others, so it is a win-win.
robinsoh 5y ago
> The e-ink patent is so frustrating. Hmm.. I keep seeing this on HN. I then ask which specific patent and I never get a satisfactory answer. But I'll keep trying. I work in the display industry and am not aware of any specific patent that is blocking progress in developing electrophoretic displays. Are you? If yes, please please point out which specific patent and how it is blocking your design.
- grawprog 5y ago
  I just have to point out, it was really easy to find these. Like took me 30 seconds. https://patents.google.com/patent/US20080043317A1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US20080043317A1/en https://patents.justia.com/assignee/e-ink-corporation https://patents.justia.com/assignee/e-ink-corporation https://patents.google.com/patent/US9341917B1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US9341917B1/en https://stks.freshpatents.com/E-Ink-Holdings-Inc-nm1.php https://stks.freshpatents.com/E-Ink-Holdings-Inc-nm1.php
  - robinsoh 5y ago
    And I have to point out that just googling for E Ink patents doesn't help us understand what point you are making. It is the equivalent of me claiming that Microsoft is blocking operating system progress and then justifying it by giving you a set of Microsoft patents. I hope the analogy is clear.
- criddell 5y ago
  When a competitor appears, they usually sue with these two patents: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6120588A/en (expired) https://patents.google.com/patent/US20160187759A1/en That said, there are a lot of inexpensive epaper panels for sale on Alibaba.
  - jandrese 5y ago
    One of China's competitive advantages is that they don't give a shit about patents. This leads to extremely fast product cycles but also occasional stories about original inventors who feel they were screwed because people in China ripped off their design and improved it without their consent (or license fees). An example: https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2018/01/31/meet-the-inventor-of-the-hoverboard-who-lost-millions-to-chinese-counterfeiters/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2018/01/31/meet-the...
visualradio 5y ago
> I'd think a more reasonable approach could be, you have a patent for 15 years (or whatever arbitrary number is reasonable) or until the patent holder makes some multiple dollar amount from things that use whatever is patented. The problem with patents is that they are national laws. A 15 year patent on a fusion reactor can be ignored by manufacturers in other countries after waiting 1 day without obtaining a license. Then domestic manufacturers are saddled with legal fees and court costs for decades. A better reform would be to require the patent filers to declare the quit price at which they are willing to immediately release the discovery into the public domain in exchange for a one time payment. Then if an inventor patents a fusion reactor, and other countries begin manufacturing it immediately while ignoring the patent, domestic manufacturers could crowd source the money to pay the quit price to the inventor to have the patent office destroy the patent after 1 day as well. > You could also add a minimum number of years (obviously less than the max mentioned above) so companies have some protection across various metrics. As long as the original inventor gets a cash reward why is a minimum time necessary? If the patent is destroyed one day after being filed the inventor still has the original copy of everything they built and cash reward, they just don't have a monopoly on the ability to make additional copies, and neither does anyone else.
TheDong 5y ago
> I'd think a more reasonable approach could be, you have a patent for [duration] or until the patent holder makes some multiple dollar amount from things that use whatever is patented. I don't think this can work in practice. How much money has amazon made off the 1-click patent? If a company patents a new machine that lets them run a factory on half the workers, how much money does that make them? Even for devices, this seems sketchy. What percent of revenue counts towards the patent? Is the $100 kindle $100 towards the e-ink patent, or $20, or $5? If the device has 50 patents on various components, is the revenue counted 50x for them, or is the cost divided between them? I think that enough patents are on internal processes and machines that revenue won't be directly tied to, i.e. on things that aren't consumer goods, that this sort of strategy won't help.
korethr 5y ago
You're right that creative accounting games could be played to try to keep money made on the patent from being considered profit. While harder, I suspect creative accounting could be used to done to make it look like there was no revenue on e-ink screens despite millions of devices containing them had been sold.
TaylorAlexander 5y ago
Yes more on 3D printers: The first FDM 3D printers went on sale in 1995 for $50k. Ten years later they were $25k. Then in 2008 the patents expired. By 2011 a halfway decent printer was $1800. By 2018 $300 3D printers were available worldwide. I joined the community in 2010, bought my own printer in 2011, and I saw the community operating with my own two eyes. Thousands of people all over the world innovating without patents to improve the situation. The idea that patents promote innovation is absurd. The primary function of the patent is to stop innovation. All those thousands of people who wanted to improve 3D printers were legally prevented from innovating while the patent was in effect. I remember in 2012 people on the mailing list talking about 3D printing on to a belt that could move. Literally no one on the mailing list wanted to risk infringing on the Makerbot patent for this even though makerbot quickly stopped selling their belt printer and never sold a new one. To this day the only belt printers that are for sale is a printer with the carriage off angle from the belt to avoid infringing the makerbot patent that hasn’t been used in years. The rate of innovation would be higher without patents. We’re hurting ourselves for the benefit of those who amassed large patent portfolios so they can charge rent on old designs instead of innovating. Imagine the health and wealth that could be generated worldwide if we let every country copy the best MRI machines we have, and all our battery factories and chip designs. That wealth would immeasurably improve the lives of people the world over, and it would come back to us in the US as new economic trading partners with their own infrastructure. Along the way they’d find 100x cost savings or better and our medical care would be cheaper. We are truly shouting ourselves in the foot with patents.

pclmulqdq 5y ago

In the EU, patents have escalating fees. They don't escalate very fast, but I think this would help with innovation a lot. IMO the first ~4 years can cost a few thousand dollars (so you can get your startup up and running), but the 20th year of a patent should escalate to several hundred thousand or million dollars. That way, building a long-lived "patent fence" becomes economically infeasible the way it is today.

chongli 5y ago
Economically infeasible for NPEs, sure, but still a rounding error for Big Tech. The issue with schemes that make it difficult for NPEs is that they hurt the small inventor who cannot afford to capitalize their invention. Owners of capital may be able to form a monopsony to drive down the price of patent licenses and essentially squeeze out small inventors.
- motives 5y ago
  Just as an example, IBM receives almost 10,000 patents a year. At $100,000-$1,000,000 per patent, that year of patents alone in 15-20 years time would cost $1-10 billion. That is most definitely not a rounding error and would constitute as much as 10% of their annual revenue just to keep that single years worth of patents. I think this sort of escalating pricing scheme would definitely help reduce the barriers for startups and new innovators, and prevent abuse by companies worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
- InspiredIdiot 5y ago
  Escalating fees still seems like a great way to limit the damage to small investors while turning the screws on NPEs, though. If the owners of capital can form this monopsony hurting small investors in the escalating fees case wouldn't they be able to do the same in the constant fee case? Is the proposition that they would be able to keep the monopsony together better with a bigger incentive (avoiding potentially high patent fees once they escalate)? It seems to me that yes it doesn't do much to reduce the use of patents by Big Tech that they are actually commercializing. It would be nice to solve all the problems but it seems like it solves some of the problems that almost everyone but NPEs can agree on in a neat way without too much collateral damage.
  - chongli 5y ago
    Big Tech can afford to spend billions on patent moats for no other reason than to suffocate any small businesses that cannot raise enough capital to pull their heads above the water. An escalating fee scheme, while not wholly responsible for the problem, seems like it adds to it. It’s yet another barrier to entry that contributes to the enormous failure rate of startups.
    - visualradio 5y ago
      Well suppose the valuation mechanism for determining the relative value of patents that the escalating fees were levied upon was implemented by requiring IP holders to declare the price at which they were willing to permanently release the discovery into the public domain in exchange for a one-time payment. The result of such a scheme might be that is nearly always cheaper to pay the patent office to permanently destroy your competitor's patents and release the discovery into the public domain for everyone then it is to hire lawyers to go to court with your competitor in order to obtain a settlement and mutual licensing agreement. So whenever large tech companies have disputes with each other they might start destroying each other's patent arsenals rather than going to court, which would level the playing field for everyone else. And if a large number of smaller startups were being harassed by a large company they could crowd source the money needed to pay the patent office to destroy the large firm's patents without spending any money on lawyers or legal fees and without having to halt development.
- Wowfunhappy 5y ago
  They might be able to afford it, but money is money. The question would be whether the cost of keeping the patent outweighs its potential profits.
  - visualradio 5y ago
    The question should be how do we eliminate unnecessary transaction costs and overheads associated with license negotiations, legal fees, and courts costs, and ensure new public inventions can be immediately manufactured by a large number of domestic firms before they are knocked off by foreign manufacturers uninterested in obtaining licenses, while still compensating the original inventor? A possible solution is to require the patent filers to declare the price at which they are willing to permanently release the invention into the public domain in exchange for a one time payment. Then if someone is sued for IP violation the defendant can crowd-source the inventor's fee and pay it through the patent office to have the the patent destroyed immediately without hiring lawyers or halt production. The IP registrar could then levy a quarterly maintenance tax on the quit price filed by the IP holder to prevent the inventor's fee from being set infinitely high.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Andrex 5y ago
I like the idea but part of me thinks that would just benefit the companies doing well and hurt companies not doing well, potentially affecting competition.
rbjorklin 5y ago
Maybe combine this with a decreasing cap on royalties making patents less profitable over time?

PicassoCTs 5y ago

A exponential cost curve to hold a patent would fix that. Every year the cost increases, making it less interesting to hold "dead" patterns bringing in no revenue.

delecti 5y ago
That feels backwards. A patent nobody wants will be public domain. A patent that's actually stifling competition will stay protected. It'll at least cost money to stay protected, so it's not completely backwards, but I don't think this is the right approach.
procombo 5y ago
Bad idea for patents. The public is vastly benefitted by patent expiration. It's also why we can have generic drugs, etc. Now, exponential cost curve for _copyrights_ is interesting. And arguably already a thing... considering that Mickey Mouse is approaching 100 years old and is not yet in the public domain.
- cogman10 5y ago
  I could see a combo approach. Ideally, I'd like to see tech patents see a sunset of something like 5 years. The current 20 year hold is bonkers. However, if we keep the 20 year lifetime, then having an exponential cost of ownership would serve to ward off patent trolling companies. They could still exist to some extent but their operational expenses would be a lot higher than they are now. It'd put a number of them out of business (or at very least free up a bunch of patents). The trick is coming up with good numbers here. Too low and you might as well not add it. Too high and you might as well eliminate patents all together as they've lost their original purpose (to protect the little inventor).
  - visualradio 5y ago
    With the proposal for continuously increasing maintenance fees on ownership it is necessary to establish some public mechanism for determining the relative value of patents upon which the the maintenance fees are levied. One possible solution is to require the IP holder to declare the quit price at which they are willing to abandon their claim and permanently release the discovery into the public domain prior to the expiration date of the patent in exchange for a one time payment. This should reduce legal fees and court costs. If a firm is notified of patent infringement and pending litigation, instead of hiring a lawyer and going to court and halting production, they could instead crowd source the funds to pay the quit price to the patent office. The patent office would then pay the original inventor and place the discovery into the public domain for everyone so that there was no basis for continuing legal action. When large tech companies have legal disputes, they might find that it is always cheaper to pay the patent office to immediately destroy each other's patent arsenals, which would also release all of the discoveries into the public domain and level the playing field for smaller firms as well. If someone is willing to pay the quit price to the original inventor there should be no problem with expiring patents which have been issued for less than 1 day. 1 business day would likely work fine as the minimum duration for patents.

Aspos 5y ago

Counterargument: I get a patent for a special-purpose shell company MegaCorpA, license the technology to MegaCorpB for $1, concentrate all the profits in MegaCorpB and thus MegaCorpA will get a perpetual patent. Tying patents to revenues of licensees does not work too, because any patent licensed to Samsung will instantly become void.

jorgemf 5y ago
>> Tying patents to revenues of licensees does not work too, because any patent licensed to Samsung will instantly become void. I don't see anything wrong with it. Other big companies will prefer to have Samsung as a partner instead as an enemy, and small companies will have very difficult to compete with samsung at scale. And if they do it is because they have done so many other things right, which it is great for consumers
- Aspos 5y ago
  Yeah, but why LG would rush into paying for the license if the patent will become free as soon as Samsung will pay to license it first? Point is, the original idea of tying patents to revenues needs more thinking.
  - jorgemf 5y ago
    Because Samsung will use LG ideas too. As a company, I think, it is better to partner with others, so it is a win-win.

robinsoh 5y ago

> The e-ink patent is so frustrating. Hmm.. I keep seeing this on HN. I then ask which specific patent and I never get a satisfactory answer. But I'll keep trying. I work in the display industry and am not aware of any specific patent that is blocking progress in developing electrophoretic displays. Are you? If yes, please please point out which specific patent and how it is blocking your design.

grawprog 5y ago
I just have to point out, it was really easy to find these. Like took me 30 seconds. https://patents.google.com/patent/US20080043317A1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US20080043317A1/en https://patents.justia.com/assignee/e-ink-corporation https://patents.justia.com/assignee/e-ink-corporation https://patents.google.com/patent/US9341917B1/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US9341917B1/en https://stks.freshpatents.com/E-Ink-Holdings-Inc-nm1.php https://stks.freshpatents.com/E-Ink-Holdings-Inc-nm1.php
- robinsoh 5y ago
  And I have to point out that just googling for E Ink patents doesn't help us understand what point you are making. It is the equivalent of me claiming that Microsoft is blocking operating system progress and then justifying it by giving you a set of Microsoft patents. I hope the analogy is clear.
criddell 5y ago
When a competitor appears, they usually sue with these two patents: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6120588A/en (expired) https://patents.google.com/patent/US20160187759A1/en That said, there are a lot of inexpensive epaper panels for sale on Alibaba.
- jandrese 5y ago
  One of China's competitive advantages is that they don't give a shit about patents. This leads to extremely fast product cycles but also occasional stories about original inventors who feel they were screwed because people in China ripped off their design and improved it without their consent (or license fees). An example: https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2018/01/31/meet-the-inventor-of-the-hoverboard-who-lost-millions-to-chinese-counterfeiters/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2018/01/31/meet-the...

visualradio 5y ago

> I'd think a more reasonable approach could be, you have a patent for 15 years (or whatever arbitrary number is reasonable) or until the patent holder makes some multiple dollar amount from things that use whatever is patented. The problem with patents is that they are national laws. A 15 year patent on a fusion reactor can be ignored by manufacturers in other countries after waiting 1 day without obtaining a license. Then domestic manufacturers are saddled with legal fees and court costs for decades. A better reform would be to require the patent filers to declare the quit price at which they are willing to immediately release the discovery into the public domain in exchange for a one time payment. Then if an inventor patents a fusion reactor, and other countries begin manufacturing it immediately while ignoring the patent, domestic manufacturers could crowd source the money to pay the quit price to the inventor to have the patent office destroy the patent after 1 day as well. > You could also add a minimum number of years (obviously less than the max mentioned above) so companies have some protection across various metrics. As long as the original inventor gets a cash reward why is a minimum time necessary? If the patent is destroyed one day after being filed the inventor still has the original copy of everything they built and cash reward, they just don't have a monopoly on the ability to make additional copies, and neither does anyone else.

TheDong 5y ago

> I'd think a more reasonable approach could be, you have a patent for [duration] or until the patent holder makes some multiple dollar amount from things that use whatever is patented. I don't think this can work in practice. How much money has amazon made off the 1-click patent? If a company patents a new machine that lets them run a factory on half the workers, how much money does that make them? Even for devices, this seems sketchy. What percent of revenue counts towards the patent? Is the $100 kindle $100 towards the e-ink patent, or $20, or $5? If the device has 50 patents on various components, is the revenue counted 50x for them, or is the cost divided between them? I think that enough patents are on internal processes and machines that revenue won't be directly tied to, i.e. on things that aren't consumer goods, that this sort of strategy won't help.

korethr 5y ago

You're right that creative accounting games could be played to try to keep money made on the patent from being considered profit. While harder, I suspect creative accounting could be used to done to make it look like there was no revenue on e-ink screens despite millions of devices containing them had been sold.

TaylorAlexander 5y ago

Yes more on 3D printers: The first FDM 3D printers went on sale in 1995 for $50k. Ten years later they were $25k. Then in 2008 the patents expired. By 2011 a halfway decent printer was $1800. By 2018 $300 3D printers were available worldwide. I joined the community in 2010, bought my own printer in 2011, and I saw the community operating with my own two eyes. Thousands of people all over the world innovating without patents to improve the situation. The idea that patents promote innovation is absurd. The primary function of the patent is to stop innovation. All those thousands of people who wanted to improve 3D printers were legally prevented from innovating while the patent was in effect. I remember in 2012 people on the mailing list talking about 3D printing on to a belt that could move. Literally no one on the mailing list wanted to risk infringing on the Makerbot patent for this even though makerbot quickly stopped selling their belt printer and never sold a new one. To this day the only belt printers that are for sale is a printer with the carriage off angle from the belt to avoid infringing the makerbot patent that hasn’t been used in years. The rate of innovation would be higher without patents. We’re hurting ourselves for the benefit of those who amassed large patent portfolios so they can charge rent on old designs instead of innovating. Imagine the health and wealth that could be generated worldwide if we let every country copy the best MRI machines we have, and all our battery factories and chip designs. That wealth would immeasurably improve the lives of people the world over, and it would come back to us in the US as new economic trading partners with their own infrastructure. Along the way they’d find 100x cost savings or better and our medical care would be cheaper. We are truly shouting ourselves in the foot with patents.