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Economic Gridlock – the Invisible Cost of IP Law
smellsofbikes writes "This week's New Yorker magazine has a financial article, 'The Permission Problem,' discussing the hidden cost of patent, trademark and copyright laws. It's a subject anyone here already knows well, but he brings up two interesting points: 1) He uses the term 'tragedy of the anticommons.' Instead of depletion of a shared resource, this describes under-use of hoarded resources: areas that can't be explored because they're encumbered by patent/copyright issues. As he points out, the result of this is an invisible loss: drugs not made, software not written. The loss is impossible to quantify and difficult to see. I like the term 'tragedy of the anticommons' because it encapsulates a long-winded explanation into a pithy, memorable phrase that will stick with people unfamiliar with the topic. 2) He also cites a study by Ben Depoorter and Sven Vanneste that discusses why anticommons effects are seen, beyond mere competition. Individual right holders value their contribution to the overall project as a significant fraction of the project value, so if there are more than three or four right holders, their perceived value can far exceed the total value of the project, making it uneconomical."
Then he's sued out of business because chances are, his novel method of transportation infringes on at least one of the big boys' patents. Sure, his propulsion method is new... but what about that suspension? OK, he's got a new suspension... but the fuel delivery system is covered. Or the windscreen.
Copyrights / patents ... if you cannot turn a profit in 14 years then it's your fault.
The system was not ORIGINALLY intended to provide someone with a lifetime's worth of income. It was to ENCOURAGE development.
Your take is absolutely correct. A place I worked got a letter from NCR once we got big enough. It basically said: "You are in the computer industry, therefore you are almost surely violating some of our patents. Either cough up x% of your revenue, or we'll go to court and find out which patents you're violating."