this post was submitted on 19 Sep 2024
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That's genuinely not as simple as you think it is. You realize there was a time before modern patent law, yes?
Patents should be banned ❤️
Patents are (at their core) a good thing. It protects little Jimmy Inventor from putting hours and his blood, sweat and tears into coming up with a novel invention, only for some big corpo to see it, steal the idea and bully Jimmy out of the market.
Jimmy has legal recourse to sue the big corpo if he has a patent, whereas without one he has nothing.
Just because the system's been gamed (especially in the US) doesn't mean it's impossible to reform, and is currently still better than nothing.
Patents are not, at their core, a good thing. They are nice for an idealized and transient scenario, but the reality of capitalism is that the vast, vast majority of investment, production, etc. are done by a handful of large companies, and that includes R&D. Patents are, in reality, overwhelmingly one of the many tools large corporations have to shut out upstarts. In short, it entrenches the power of monopolies, trusts, and similar large businesses.
And that's without even starting on how the law can be abused and, with the way our legal systems work, it is fundamentally more abusable for the side that has more money and can afford top corporate lawyers to concoct convenient arguments, leaving little Jimmy in the dust.