Patents certainly cause unforeseen damage all the time, sometimes with damages with far too many zeros to be considered at all reasonable (like what happened to

Patents certainly cause unforeseen damage all the time, sometimes with damages with far too many zeros to be considered at all reasonable (like what happened to Blackberry a few years back). My personal belief regarding software is that if a skilled practitioner of the art can come up with a particular solution when given similar design constraints for solving a problem, the solution should not be considered novel and worthy of patent protection. Sadly this is not anywhere close to how patents actually work in the real world.