One of the most interesting turns in public opinion has been the view of patents in technology. I don't really know when it started happening, but I feel like an awful lot of people went from "uh, I don't really care" to straight up "I hate patents, they should not exist".
apple vs samsung.
I am (of course) talking about the ongoing patent trial between Apple and Samsung. The Verge has it covered really well (plus I shared my own view of it here). The number one line of thought I hear: going from "Apple's patents are not valid" to "Why do patents exist, anyway?". This is the time when I come in.
the role of patents.
To be clear, most of the following thoughts have been in my head for a long time and I just couldn't formulate them in a publishable manner. Then I listened to one of the latest Vergecast shows and Nilay Patel, a lawyer and a tech journalist pretty much said what I had been trying to: the reason why patents exist and why they're a great thing.
what is a patent?
Wikipedia defines patent as:
A patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention.
Yeah, so patent is the state giving you the exclusive rights to something you invented, for the exchange of public disclosure of the invention. So when a company invents a new piece of technology, for instance, it gets to decide what they do with it - sell it, use it, forget it. They get these rights for a couple of years, after which this invention becomes a public property (anyone can use it).
what the world would be like without patents.
The world w/out patents: The same company invents a new piece of technology. Again, they decide what they do with it - sell it, use it, forget it. But they could hide this invention from the rest of the world for unlimited period of time - even for tens or hundreds of years. Which naturally causes other companies to eventually invent similar stuff. So instead of the human society building upon what other individuals built in the past, many companies would be stuck on the same problems. Which would slow down innovation - even to a halt. Companies would keep all of their know-how to themselves and the world would only slowly become a more educated place.
thank god, i mean our ancestors, for patents.
Let's travel back to our 'patent-full' reality. Companies invent amazing new stuff which they later patent (protect from competition). This enables them to sell products based on this invention and get back the money they had to invest into research (without which there wouldn't be any inventions). There would be no motivation to invent, if they only invested into research and never received the money back. No company can work like this.
In the patent application, though, they have to describe in detail, how to assemble/build/create the invention in a language that any regular person could understand. These companies (through patents) are creating this amazing library of well-explained inventions (and how anyone can follow their lead and assemble/create/build the same things for themselves).
One huge library of human knowledge. Companies building upon what the other had invented. Just for a couple of years of exclusive rights on the patent. Isn't that pretty cool?
got it?
The next time you hear someone complaining about patents, just calm them down and tell them to go read more. Because people that criticise patents are usually the same people that don't really understand how inventions and society works.
Let's be a better generation through education and knowledge. Let's not wine about stuff, let's just make things better.
attaching the patent application of Thomas Edison's most famous invention.
