Re:Patents are GOOD (Score 1)

I agree with vertical-limit that people attack the patent system for their self interest. Patent emphasizes on creating new things --- so even if you wrote trillion lines of codes, but if they were nothing new, you could not get a patent. Different from what is mentioned in Bessen and Maskin's paper, inventors apply patents not only to raise money to cover the R&D cost, but also to maximize their profits. Money is certainly one of the reasons for people to create. But on the other hand, inventors often invent something that do not have commerical values. So it is necessary for inventors to maiximize their profit in order to cover the R&D cost of the unsuccessful inventions, and also other future projects. When outside investors are involved, it is necessary for a company to protect its IP to maximize the profit of its investors. If a company wanted to compete with Amazon, it should do the homework finding a way to work around the patent. Without proper IP protection, first commers, who make all the mistake and lose money during the R&D phase, might find it difficult to compete with the second commers, who avoid making mistakes and losing money by following behind.