[Linux-aus] Patent costs - from slashdot

[Janet Hawtin]

A book due out next year that claims that beginning in the late 1990s, on
average patents cost companies more than they earned
them<http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/15/business/yourmoney/15proto.html/partner/rssnyt>.
A big exception was pharmaceuticals, which accounted for 2/3 of the revenues
attributable to patents. The authors of the book Do Patents
Work?<http://www.researchoninnovation.org/dopatentswork/>(synopsis and
sample chapters), James Bessen and Michael J. Meurer of the
Boston University School of Law, have crunched the numbers and say that,
especially in the IT industry, patents no longer make economic sense. Their
views are less radical than those of a pair of Washington University at St.
Louis economists who argue that the patent system should be abolished
outright <http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/againstnew.htm>.
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