There was a guy named Bob Kearns who, 40-some years ago, invented a gizmo to delay the cycle of windshield wipers for driving in misty conditions. He approached the Detroit automobile manufacturers, and they blew him off -- then turned around and added the feature to their cars. Kearns sued them all, one by one, and eventually collected something like what the idea was worth. If there were no patent protection, he would have been out of luck.

In the 1980s, Eastman Kodak came out with an instant picture camera that essentially used the same processes as the patented ones of Polaroid. Polaroid sued and won, and Kodak had to withdraw from the market. With no patent protection, I think there is no question that Kodak would have eventually driven them out of the market altogether. Sure, you could say that the owners of the Kodak cameras suffered as a result (although Kodak did compensate them), but was it really right for Kodak to benefit from the processes that Polaroid invented?

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