>They're getting their monopoly, what did we get? Zilch. We get to buy a product that we otherwise may not have been able to. The original purpose of patents i

>They're getting their monopoly, what did we get? Zilch. We get to buy a product that we otherwise may not have been able to. The original purpose of patents is debatable (just read this thread), but one cannot reasonably argue against the current understanding of their purpose, which is to encourage invention. Patents on (some) "obvious-after-the-fact" things encourage invention. Why bother to put in time and effort to invent something when BigCo. will simply roll out their own before you can even bring it to market? Now I'm not saying all obvious-after-the-fact inventions should be patented, my original argument was against using obvious-after-the-fact as an exclusionary test. One should attempt to judge obviousness before it was proven to be viable using the given method, as an after-the-fact judgement is inherently biased.