School of Law Slams Patents

James Bessen of the Boston University School of Law has published a paper demonstrating that software patents are not beneficial to the software industry. He finds that a overwhelming majority of software firms do not employ patents, that an overwhelming majority of patents are obtained by a few large corporations, and that both the number of patents and the risk of patent litigation are increasing dramatically. The summary concludes by saying "Given these findings, it is hard to conclude that software patents have provided a net social benefit in the software industry."