> The great thing about patents is that they force people to publish the knowledge so it won't be lost to the sands of time when they close up shop. That work

> The great thing about patents is that they force people to publish the knowledge so it won't be lost to the sands of time when they close up shop. That works when the patents is some simple thing anyone can understand. Nothing is like that anymore. Every interesting line of research requires a specialist to understand it, and every specialist represents a high opportunity cost. In practice only a few people could hope to benefit from the publication. Throw into that the fact that it's actually lawyers who write patents, and thus they are written in legalese.