>> 1. The inventor would pay the R&D costs with no good way to recoup them, because he'd be competing against knockoffs who didn't have to make that investment, and can price accordingly. You'd be putting the actual inventor at a disadvantage.
>> 2. There'd be no incentive for inventors to actually publish designs for their inventions. Most people who argue against patents as a concept forget is that to get one you have to publish plans for your idea openly, which makes it much easier to copy. The limited monopoly is an incentive to part with that information. You'd end up leaving the public domain poorer.
> So what? They would just need to sell the research at profit instead of subsidizing it with future monopoly revenue.
That doesn't actually address the concern; it just moves it around a little.
So, there's at least two cases to consider: something that was difficult to develop and either a) easy to reverse engineer or b) hard to reverse engineer.
With (a), why would someone pay for the research when it's just going to be cloned by their competitors for free? It's the same situation the inventor is in.
With (b), why would the inventor ever publicize the research behind the invention or product? It'd end up being a trade secret, and probably be monopolized (for potential a longer period) or lost altogether.
For instance, with 3D printers, maybe instead of them becoming ubiquitous after the patent expiration, the inventor kept the technology secret and used to start a rapid prototyping company. Maybe they couldn't keep that up forever, but it's quite conceivable they could for longer than a patent term.
> And remember how putting a 3D printer in a box to keep the material warm has been patented? Suuuure, wouldn't get discovered independently.
That's not an argument against patents, but an argument against the current threshold of patentability. Also, there are a lot of things that only seem obvious after you've seen them done.
>> 2. There'd be no incentive for inventors to actually publish designs for their inventions. Most people who argue against patents as a concept forget is that to get one you have to publish plans for your idea openly, which makes it much easier to copy. The limited monopoly is an incentive to part with that information. You'd end up leaving the public domain poorer.
> So what? They would just need to sell the research at profit instead of subsidizing it with future monopoly revenue.
That doesn't actually address the concern; it just moves it around a little.
So, there's at least two cases to consider: something that was difficult to develop and either a) easy to reverse engineer or b) hard to reverse engineer.
With (a), why would someone pay for the research when it's just going to be cloned by their competitors for free? It's the same situation the inventor is in.
With (b), why would the inventor ever publicize the research behind the invention or product? It'd end up being a trade secret, and probably be monopolized (for potential a longer period) or lost altogether.
For instance, with 3D printers, maybe instead of them becoming ubiquitous after the patent expiration, the inventor kept the technology secret and used to start a rapid prototyping company. Maybe they couldn't keep that up forever, but it's quite conceivable they could for longer than a patent term.
> And remember how putting a 3D printer in a box to keep the material warm has been patented? Suuuure, wouldn't get discovered independently.
That's not an argument against patents, but an argument against the current threshold of patentability. Also, there are a lot of things that only seem obvious after you've seen them done.