The funny thing is that we're not the first nation to try an IP-based strategy towards monetizing its scientific know-how. Post-World-War-II Britain had all sorts of stuff going on: the first passenger jet aircraft (the de Havilland Comet), lots of early computer work (the Manchester group in particular invented index registers and the most reliable RAM technology before core; the LEO was the first machine actually used by a business), and even Watson, Crick, and Rosalind Franklin doing DNA. But rather than trying to foster businesses built around these innovations, the government instead pursued a strategy of trying to monetize licenses for them.
There's a book from MIT Press which describes how this went in the computer field in particular. It's a very dry read, but it's one of these things where the title tells the tale: "Innovating for Failure".
I didn't know there was precedent for the moronic positions of most university tech transfer offices. Ah, humans: making the same mistakes, over and over again.
You can see how very far we are from any kind of sensible patent reform here. Yglesias seems to understand, but check the comments.
The general progressive public is still entriely under the illusion of the patent bar. They really believe PTO would never allow you to patent mathematical laws, algorithms, laws of nature, business processes, obvious extensions of established methods, well-known existing practices, and all the other corruptions common in software patents. Quite a lot of them argue that such abuses must not exist because there are supposedly rules against them.
My favorite example of the broken patent system is United States Patent 6368227: Method of swinging on a swing.
Abstract: "A method of swing on a swing is disclosed, in which a user positioned on a standard swing suspended by two chains from a substantially horizontal tree branch induces side to side motion by pulling alternately on one chain and then the other."
That link is to a pro-patent website which notes that Smucker failed to enforce the patent (against a grocer from Michigan), after multiple rounds of reexamination, and concludes, of course, that the! system! works! Strangely, they fail to mention the amount of money and time lost to the grocer in fighting Smuckers's overreach...
Reading the title, I was really excited thinking this was going to be a Boondock-Saints-esque vigilante justice mission against patent trolls. Needless to say, I was sorely disappointed after clicking through.
Actually, the line that struck me from last night's speech is how the President expressed his belief (with a careless laugh) there will be no "pat downs" on high speed rails vs airports, when the reality is they are already doing it at some bus stations and seaports (not to mention how he thinks they are just simple "pat downs").
There's a book from MIT Press which describes how this went in the computer field in particular. It's a very dry read, but it's one of these things where the title tells the tale: "Innovating for Failure".
MIT Press page here: http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?tid=6166...