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Entirely anecdotal, but I once had a professor invite a person from our University's patent office to come and explain some things about intellectual property t
by TallGuyShort 13y ago
Entirely anecdotal, but I once had a professor invite a person from our University's patent office to come and explain some things about intellectual property to us. I was disgusted by how he bragged about the number of law suits the university had prosecuted, rather than the number of successful innovations that had been brought to the industry. I think it's great for university's to drive innovation and adoption, but I must question the motives of some of the individuals.
- chrismcb 13y agoWhat is there to question? Either their motive is to make money, or it is to do as much research as possible. But it takes money to do research. One way to get money is to patent and license what you have so you can continue to innovate (which is the main reason why we have patents in the first place)
- georgemcbay 13y agoActually the real "main reason" we have patents (in the US) is to avoid people not sharing trade secrets, which was a real problem with industry in the 1700s but is not one now. The justification for them being a way to ensure the "inventor" is compensated came much later and Thomas Jefferson would likely be spinning in his grave if he knew how they were used now.