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Studies on economics and innovation
Numerous studies have shown that software patents are bad for innovation and national economies. Here's a collection of evidence.
Contents
ESP Wiki articles
Articles generally contain quotes and excerpts.
- Harvard 2019 study on government technology policy effects - Harvard Business School
- US GAO 2013 report on patent litigation - US Government Accountability Office
- 2009 patent litigation study - PriceWaterhouseCoopers, January 2010
- Venturous Australia - 2009
- Patents and the Regress of Useful Arts - Torrance and Tomlinson, 2009
- 2008 State of Software Patents - Klemens, 2008
- 2008 Berkeley Patent Survey
- Although not a study, the Aerotel v. Telco ruling of 2006 in the UK contains detailed commentary
- Rethinking the European ICT agenda - PriceWaterhouseCoopers, September 2004
- Innovation in Germany, Windows of opportunity - Deutsche Bank Research, June 2004
- An Empirical Look at Software Patents - Bessen and Hunt, March 2004
- US FTC report on innovation - US Federal Trade Commission, October 2003
- Gowers Review of Intellectual Property - commissioned by the UK Chancellor of the Exchequer, December 2006
- Network Competition Through Regulation report - German Monopoly Commission, 2002
All studies
2019
2013
2012
- The Case Against Patents, by Michele Boldrin and David K. Levine. Working Paper 2012-035A, commissioned by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, Research Division. (and here's a summary)
- Scaling the Patent System (direct link), by Christina Mulligan and Timothy B. Lee. Summarizing article at Ars Technica here.
2011
- A Generation of Software Patents (direct link), James Bessen
- US FTC 2011: Aligning Patent Notice and Remedies with Competition
- The Private and Social Costs of Patent Trolls (direct link, excerpts), Bessen, Ford, Meurer
2010
- Costs of the Patent System Revisited, by Stephan Kinsella, which estimates that the whole cost of the patent system in the USA is US$42 billion per year
- Patent Quality and Settlement Among Repeat Patent Litigants, by Allison, Lemley & Walker, shows that only 12.5% of software patents are upheld by courts (see also: software patent quality is terrible)
2009
- Modeling a Paradigm Shift: From Producer Innovation to User and Open Collaborative Innovation. Carliss Y. Baldwin and Eric A. Von Hippel. November 25, 2009. Harvard Business School. MIT Sloan School of Management.
2008
- 2008 Berkeley Patent Survey
- Debugging Software Patents: Increasing Innovation and Reducing Uncertainty in the Judicial Design of Optimal Software Patent Law, Robert E. Thomas, University of Florida - Warrington College of Business Administration; Business Law & Legal Studies
2004
- Innovation in Germany – Windows of opportunity, Deutsche Bank Research for the German government, 2004.
- An Empirical Look at Software Patents, Bessen & Hunt, 2004.
2003
- Matthew Broersma: "Developers gather to protest patents" (CNET, April 28, 2003), which said or is used to support somebody saying: "United States, where such patents are allowed, large corporations such as IBM routinely stockpile patents to be used against competitors--usually to the detriment of smaller companies"
1999
- Kevin G. Rivette & David Kline: "Surviving a War With Patents" (UpsideToday v. 10.12.1999), which is used to support the claim that "patents can be used to delay or stifle innovation through the use of patent pools, patent thickets, exclusive licensing, and other abusive patent enforcement tactics"
1966
Related pages on ESP Wiki
- More than innovation - software patents harm innovation, but the problems are also much bigger than just innovation
- Books about software and patents
- There may be more studies in the references of the online book Against Intellectual Monopoly, such as those of chapter 3's mention of a year 2000 Carnegie Survey
- Sources of software patent news
- List of recordings and transcripts
External links
Reports
For each of these, we should make a wiki page, like the above-linked pages, to explain the relevance and to point readers to the most important parts of the documents.
- http://www.researchoninnovation.org/swpat.pdf - economists against swpat
- http://www.researchoninnovation.org/patent.pdf - Bessen and Maskin, MIT research
- http://www.kuesterlaw.com/swpat.html - a 1995 paper by a USA laywer
- http://www.marsouin.org/IMG/pdf/Jullien-Zimmermann_8-2005.pdf
Other collections of links
FFII pages
- An FFII page of economics studies
- Another FFII collection of economic studies (see directory for LaTeX/bibtex sources)
- A list of studies on the Wiki of the European petition to stop software patents
- Studies and Opinions related to the Software Patent Directive Project
- Studies about software patents taken into account by the EP in first reading, 2003
