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Originally Posted by hyfe
The key issue and main problem as far as I see it is thus, that other research teams may make the same breakthroughs, without any knowledge of the first teams work at all and they will still not be allowed to use their own invention. You are thus not only barred from copying the invention, you are barred from doing the same invention yourself, even if it can be conclusivly proved that it was impossible for you to have any knowledge of other work whatsoever at the time you discovered it. Since the world is a fairly big place nowadays, similar solutions will be found irrespective of eachothers research.
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So when the research department of MegaCorp1 patents something the research dept of MegaCorp2 was working on, why is that something you care about?
A patent may be an exclusive right, but the first thing any inventor does is sell the patent to the highest bidder, who will then licence the patent as they see fit. You aren't barred, you're just obliged to pay whoever invented it first. The researchers that come in second place will get paid either way; they'll be working for a large company, or venture capitalists, or some similar form of insurance, unless they were silly.
There is the issue of fair competition: companies could hoard patents from their competitors. Hence the idea of "reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing" on software patents on things like MPEG. But it's no different from any other property in this respect - if Coca-Cola gained marketshare from Pepsi, they might offer to buy up some of Pepsi's factories (and change the labels), and if Pepsi really wanted to refuse they could, even though it'd harm consumers.