[ARS] The true cost of patent trolling - Page 5

I think if it's your idea and no one has had an idea like it you have the right to profit off it before anyone else can jump in on it. There's no right or wrong answer here. But one thing I will say is human nature is fickle and greedy, no one can deny this. There are people out there who may not fit this trend but they are by no means anywhere near a majority.

Without the patent system like someone said earlier the pharmaceuticals industry would go bust. You try to tell a company to spend billions of dollars for hte betterment of society only without a payoff. They'll laugh and all pull their money out of the company (those that can move fast enough) and it will shut down. When a person (or firm) spends time, money, and effort to design something new and innovative they have the right to own that design for a certain period of time (don't know how long it should be but it would depend on the product). Do it for the betterment of society only? Sorry that won't happen, sad simple truth, deal with it.

One thing I do take serious issue with in the patent system are these patent trolling companies which go around patenting everything and not even putting it into use, just patenting it and waiting for someone to misstep and try to **** them over. That **** should be punishable because you're actively detracting from societal advancement and not trying to develop anything off of these ideas. But patenting something that you made yourself and someone blatantly ripped off you should be allowed to. When firms (in the chinese knockoff furniture example) rip off the design of the item they often also find a way to make the name awfully similar to the original (I remember the PS1 clone the Poly Station, I was very young and almost fell for it). That's obvious intent to steal client base by willfully mimicking a product. People can argue that people will purchase the expensive one if they wanted it but the fact is that companies aren't worried about the guaranteed (read: rich person) buy, they're worried about getting the fringe customers who might say well this looks almost the same is decent quality for cheaper.

The thing is... patents aren't stopping that to begin with.

And even then the problem is a result of the backwards "money is everything" mentality that people seem to have.
We live in a society that "wants" competition but tries it's damnedest to prevent it at the same time.


Also saying anything is "human nature" is a pisspoor excuse, we live in a constant denial of nature all our lives.

Pisspoor excuse? It's animalistic nature and you can fight it all you want, it's like fight or flight, it's ingrained. We as a species will always look for a way to gain and retain an advantage over other members of our species and others alike. We developed tools to give us an advantage over animals, and we are greedy when it comes to anything because a part of us deep down is certain that it is imperative to our survival, even if it isn't.

Whether or not patents are stopping it is up for debate. You could argue that Apple's recent ruling shows it working (I'm not going to go any further than this and please don't flame me on this, it's an example no more no less). And frankly when you see someone making something like this



which is without a doubt a blatant rip of this



It pisses me off. That's someone else's design. Someone else slaved over a drawing board for hours to try and make every single curve. Then a sculptor spent even more time making prototypes at 1/4 scale. And after all that a full size scale was made of clay and refined and remade time and time again before they finally made it. For someone to just come by and take it after all that work and pay no homage or fees to the person who literally worked day in day out for MONTHS if not YEARS on that design with no repurcussions? **** that.

Except most of those things don't come from nature, they come from nurture.
And fight of flight may be ingrained, but we can also learn to think beyond it. Hence why "nature" is a pisspoor excuse. "Nature" isn't an absolute it can be changed.

We do learn to think beyond it you're right. There's no doubt about it that people do not always exhibit fight of flight, but that's only when they believe the danger they are in is avoidable, or they're just crazy. But it's just that, but when you're put in an extreme situation (such as defending billions of dollars) you will take the route 9 times out of 10. I guess agree to disagree

For that table example there's a billion and one reasons for luxury. A typical "average" dinner table will be made of particle wood. It might not last that long, or look as nice, or have as much detail, but you're right you can eat off it fine. But if you want something that will last you maybe 50 60 years if not more you'd go for a stained mahogany or other heavy wood table that has been properly treated and cured. That tends to be a luxury item. With a car you want something that maybe has the ability to act quick when needed but is still incredibly comfortable and enjoyable to drive.

In a table, yeah that makes sense, but I can see someone wanting a luxury car over a base corolla though for the interior niceties. In jeans, I usually wear designer (Lucky, Guess, or Buckle) jeans because they fit me better than most cheaper brands. I'm not sure if you'd call $100 jeans luxury or not though...

You there rich people an your fancy pantaloons I tell you what!

I'll stick with my $15 old navy jeans!

 

inb4 someone taking a complex issue and summing it up into a single explanation...

How about instead of handing out we actually teach the idiots to GROW FOOD instead. Most places they just are lazy sucking on the American tit because why work when you get it for free?