Now, another scary thought: what if someone stole the code and databases to your web-service?
This exactly.
It's easy for a community oriented around mostly around things like webapps, SaaS, enterprisey stuff to hop on the anti-IP bandwagon. It just so happens that there's no convenient ways of pirating their software.
It doesn't "just so happen". SaaS and web-apps arose deliberately on the marketplaces as a way of producing software that could not be pirated without actually getting past firewalls and cracking private servers.
Nothing would happen if somebody stole their software. Exactly nothing. You think if you somehow copied Zuckerberg's hard disk in 2004, you'd have the billion-dollar business now? No, you'd have a pile of 8-year-old useless code. The code doesn't matter, the people building the company and writing that code to accomodate specific (and rapidly changing) needs matter.
This exactly.
It's easy for a community oriented around mostly around things like webapps, SaaS, enterprisey stuff to hop on the anti-IP bandwagon. It just so happens that there's no convenient ways of pirating their software.