U.S. Judge Calls Patents a "Problem"
Posner is a unique personality in the U.S. Justice system today. As a member of the 7th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, he has been the most vocal judge against an apparent abuse of the legal system by companies to gain an advantage over their rivals. Posner described the process to Reuters as a "constant struggle for survival" and as a "jungle" environment in which "animals will use all the means at their disposal, all their teeth and claws that are permitted by the ecosystem."
However, he noted that while some industries (such as pharmaceuticals) can protect their staggering investments in product development with patents, software companies and gadget makers have much lower investment volumes. He said that the technology industry's "high profits and volatility made patent litigation attractive for companies looking to wound competitors," Firstpost wrote.
“It's not clear that we really need patents in most industries," Posner told Reuters. "You just have this proliferation of patents. It's a problem." Patent infringement claims have become a competitive tool, as opposed to a tool to protect actual innovation. Referring to Apple's claims, he said that patent litigation is "a small expense for them." On the note of him throwing out the case between Motorola and Apple, Posner said that he "didn't think [he] could have a trial just for fun.”
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Yes, patents are a cancer indeed.
I wonder if we will ever get to see when all those criminals get put into jail.
He should reside on all patent infringement trials.
When you or someone you love gets cancer, be sure to ask them to treat with drugs that did not cost millions of dollars to find or create, and make. Tell them you only want those cheap drugs.
K2N hater didn't say anything about the R&D costs, only the costs to buy the medicine when you need it.
Once the drugs are ready for general consumption, the medical company could be required to have fair prices through some sort of regulation. They could license it out as you stated or do one or more of many other things. There are changes that could be implemented. Granted, as you said, change is hard. Greed rules in the business sector and this industry is particularly ingrained in that because it can be, although I'm not downplaying the depth in which greed infested other industries.
Some drugs and treatments take as much as 20 BILLION USD to complete (although thats the highest end) and entire lifetimes of highly educated professionals who dedicated themselves entirely to the development process.
They also take 10-20 years, and it some rare cases much much more, entire generations.
Can you compare that to the software and tech industry ? What would happen to android and crapple if their stuff took 20 years and 20B$ per feature to develop ?
Also, on many drugs the patents can only be enforced within the 1st 5 or 10 years (dont rememebr exactly), this is to help these companies recoup the initial investment. Often times it takes about a decade before they see 1st positive ROI, not so in the software industry.
Hence pharma and tech patents are not a very good comparison.
I do applaud judge Posner, may there be many more like him, patenting needs to be sorted out and applied where its needed and functional not just because an entity files for it.
This would solve a lot of problems in tech world, dont want to litigate or deal with lawsuits ? Wait then out.
I'm pretty sure that tech patents do expire. It might be something like 10 or 20 years, but they expire eventually. The problem that I'd see with them is that many of them wouldn't expire until they're almost useless for anything other than patent trolling.