I'm not really convinced of this at all. Especially since the fear of monopolies seems to magically vanish when its monopolies the government creates (and no I'

I'm not really convinced of this at all. Especially since the fear of monopolies seems to magically vanish when its monopolies the government creates (and no I'm not talking about the water plant or whatever). For example, for all the fear mongering about Microsoft's monopoly in the 90s, the reality ended up being that the free market is a fickle mistress and Microsoft's power dwindled pretty quickly when mobile and web came around and changed the game on them (see: innovator's dilemma). Another great example is AOL/Time Warner. All those lawsuits and extensive government intervention were complete wastes of money, and I wouldn't be surprised if 10 years from now all the current "dominant players" have been overrun as well. Compare this to the monopolies granted and supported by the government in the form of patents and copyrights. Disney, while gaining its early success from taking from the public domain, enjoys Congress' approval to basically get indefinite copyright extensions and never have to relinquish any of their work. We the tax payer get to subsidize reducing Disney's competition. And hopefully here I don't have to go into the details of how detrimental technology patents have been to both consumers and new businesses (and arguably even the companies that hold the patents!). In other words, I'm actually not that scared of "natural" monopolies: i.e. monopolies that get to where they are legitimately through actually convincing 100% of consumers to buy their product, vs. by filing paperwork to the US government and then sending cease and desist letters to competitors. I also believe it would be much harder to attain such a "natural" monopoly in a patentless world. What scares me is the interaction between corporations and governments to establish monopolies that legally cannot be challenged, or alternatively, to augment their monopolies by influencing high ranking members of congress. I'd gladly trade the risk of doom-and-gloom potential monopolies for eliminating patents.