Opportunism: How to change the world one idea at a time
Levi Shapiro advises digital media companies from Hollywood to Herzilya
Pituach. From his base in Los Angeles, he works closely with
"unleavened" (emerging) companies in technology, media and telecom as a
strategy consultant.The US patent system is failing. Developed 231 years ago by the first US Patent Examiner, Thomas Jefferson, there is now a backlog of 1.2 million applications. Of these, almost 750,000 have never even been opened. Similarly, the number of pending Board of Patent Appeals ex-parte cases grew from 742 in 2005 to over 20,000 today. In fact, according to a 2010 study by the London School of Economics, the US leads the world in the cost of foregone innovation- employers and jobs that don't exist because of the inability to obtain a patent.
Seeking to remedy the situation, the Obama Administration doubled the number of patent reviewers and championed the Patent Reform Act of 2011. However, these actions simply modify a failed system. In the new book, Opportunism: How to Change the World- One Idea at a Time,
Israeli property attorney Shraga Biran advocates a completely different
approach toward intellectual property law. Biran would stimulate more
economic opportunity for the creative, scientific and artistic classes
by recognizing and protecting nascent IDEAS as an
asset, rather than simply the finished product. He proposes a "right of
opportunity" as an alternative to patent law, enabling individual
members of society to more directly profit from the exploitation of
their ideas.
Currently, the start-up community perceives patents as a tool to inhibit innovation. That was the conclusion of a 2009 research study
from UC Berkeley. Today, less than one quarter of software startups
even bother to file a patent. Instead, the patent system is used by
large companies to extort license fees from competitors. Pam Samuelson,
one of the Berkeley report co-authors, concludes the beneficiaries of
the patent system are not entrepreneurs.
The economy today is dominated by intangible wealth. According to a 2010 World Bank report
by Susana Ferreira and Kirk Hamilton, 60-80% of the world's wealth is
based on intangible assets. Despite this, legal frameworks ignore the
contribution of intangible human, social and institutional capital while
ascribing a premium to physical assets. For example, in the last
quarter of the twentieth century, the patent system enabled drug
companies to raise prices by 1,267% while simultaneously reducing
headcount. The fantastic wealth accumulation and 40% gross margins the
industry enjoyed did not accrue to individual scientists, university
research labs or even the greater humanity- it went to patent holders
and patent trolls.
Citing the internet as an example of social privatization, Biran
puts forth a theory of opportunity as a dynamic and inclusive concept.
He advocates a Registry of Ideas and Public Market to facilitate free
exchange through open access. Idea owners should be able to enjoy the
economic benefits of their efforts, in a system that remunerates the
broad exchange of ideas. Biran's system rejects neo-liberalism in favor
of new property frameworks and social privatization. "The new
Opportunism can bring about a Renaissance in applied knowledge and a
more stable society." While Biran's proposal is unlikely to be adopted
in the short-term, most of us would agree that real, fundamental change
is required. In the words of Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz,
maintaining the current system is like "giving a massive blood
transfusion to a patient that has been suffering from internal
hemorrhage."
