Re:Better Idea... (Score 2, Interesting)

Well, those of us who have had any dealings with Patent suits can tell you that there is certainly room for improvement. But it's not enough to say the system sucks and we could do without it. There definitely needs to be some sort of protections in place. Just speaking as an engineer and armchair philosopher: What if in addition to granting a monopoly on a particular idea (or implementation or whatever that law resolves to) the patent also guaranteed the right of anybody to license that patent as part of an improvement patent; perhaps by setting a fixed percentage (say 20%) of earned profits from improvements to the original patent holder for the duration of the patent life. I invent a better mousetrap and patent it. If anybody wants to use that patent as is, they have to bargain with me. But if somebody is able to improve on my patent, they can do so without my permission by just paying me the set percentage of profits earned. If somebody then improves on that patent, they would pay the second patent holder the set 20% who would in turn pay me 20% of that. The open source community gets a free ride so long as they aren't making money on it. This way, inventors benefit from their own efforts, but innovation is not prevented. Plus, the value of an original patent becomes diminished with an increasing number of improvements, which only seems fair. What do you think?