Quote from: CIYAM on March 06, 2015, 04:09:25 AM

Quote from: Quickseller on March 06, 2015, 04:02:53 AM

Patents are a very important piece of business as they give business the protection they need for their investment in research and development of new technology and products.

That is what is often "claimed" but I've actually seen very little real evidence to back up said claims (but I've seen plenty of evidence to show that patents are being used to stifle innovation by companies that own them yet don't actual "use" them for anything except to prevent others from using a technology that they don't want to succeed).

I would agree that we need some kind of reform when it comes to patient laws. There is an excess amount of litigation regarding patients, and many patients are created just to litigate in the future (and patients are often purchased for the sole purpose of litigation).

With that being said however I think that companies do need protection for their investments they make when inventing something. Why should you invest significant amounts of money to make some kind of invention when you could just wait for someone else to do the 'heavy lifting' for you.

Quote from: CIYAM on March 06, 2015, 04:09:25 AM

Quote from: Quickseller on March 06, 2015, 04:02:53 AM

What would stop one of your customers from copying your design? The process would not be as easy as in Soros Shorts's hypothetical example, however someone could reverse engineer a design and dump it on the market.

Reverse engineering was how we got PC clones - but funnily enough IBM didn't go out of business did they?

I honestly cannot say I am familiar with PC clones. However I can say that one of the biggest costs that mining manufacturers have is R&D. If someone was able to skip the R&D phase of developing their miners then they would be able to sell their miners for significantly less then companies that did need to bear this expense.