Opinion: Our Patent System is Broken

First, a disclaimer:  I am not in any way an expert on patents or patent law.

I just don't think patents do what they were meant to do.  Of all things, a movie I watched last year kind of woke me up to this, and then the "patent wars" amongst smartphone manufacturers has driven the point home for me. 

If you haven't watched the movie "Flash of Genius", I highly recommend it.  The gist of the movie is that Ford takes an intelligent man's invention of intermittent windshield wipers and runs with it.  They tell the inventor that his invention really isn't that great, and proceed to include it in the Ford Mustang without his approval.  He sues Ford and eventually wins, but it is a long process that basically costs him his family (his wife leaves him when he is so obsessed with getting the rights to his invention back and compensation).  His patent for the idea protected him in the end, but the lengths he had to go to surprised me, and it got me to thinking about the power corporations have over individuals in cases such as this.

Corporations can afford to have legal experts on staff.  Some even employ patent "trolls" to diligently look for ways other companies are violating their patents.  Corporations patent things that amaze me, ideas that don't seem very new and novel at all.  But they have the money and power to push their patents through the system in ways that the vast majority of individuals just can't.

Idealistically, I thought patents were meant to protect individuals' ideas, but realistically, they have become ways for corporations to make more money.  Most engineers I know have to sign off on their right to patent new ideas on their own when they hire on at a corporation.  Typically, they only have to patent their ideas through the corporation that employs them if it relates to the corporation's business and market, but that isn't always the case.  I've witnessed the incredibly long process a person might have to go through if their idea is not related to the business and they want to keep their individual right to it.

I've told my kids that I'd love to have a lawyer in the family, for this and other reasons.  Sometimes I think the best way I could have helped my husband financially is if I did have a law degree to help him actually patent some of his new ideas.  Sadly, he may never put the effort behind getting his own patents.

And what about the "patent wars" between Apple and Samsung, as well as other technology companies?  Is it really helping technology progress?  I don't personally think so.  I don't dispute that Apple has come up with some novel ideas that they probably deserve patent protection for.  However, many of the things that have come out of recent cases have been ridiculous.  Some basic things should be able to be reverse engineered and then improved upon.  Android is not a complete copy of Apple's mobile operating system any more than Apple's mobile operating system is a clone of Windows Mobile, Blackberry, and other forerunners.

What are your thoughts?