A patent is a document that teaches a novel, useful and non-obvious idea in such a way that anyone skilled in the art can duplicate it.
As such, patent are the engine that drives innovation.
Patents per se are an important part of a civilized society, one of the essential bureaucracies even of a free-market society.
As with many things in America, lawyers have screwed this one up. Too many patents issued for too much minutiae; conversely, preposterous ‘concept patents’ on nebulous things. Too many companies/people intimidated by patent lawyers and not getting their day in court.
Not to mention you don’t actually have to build it to get the patent. That way you can sue (lawyers, again) when someone else figures out how to make it/make it work.
Yes, and trust in enforcement of the patent is also essential.
Henry Bessemer invented an ingenious process for producing bronze powder (used in "gold" paint). It was a very efficient method compared to the time-honored system of using manual labor to pound sheets of bronze into flakes.
In his autobiography Bessemer explained why he decided to keep the process secret instead of relying on a patent. He was concerned that a patent could easily be violated by duplicating his machinery in small colonies that do not respect English patents. Only the bronze powder would be imported and there would be no proof that it was produced using his method.
So Bessemer built a small factory to produce bronze powder and kept the full details of the process secret by compartmentalizing the different stages of the operation. The workers in the different rooms did not even see each other and would even enter the factory by different entrances.
It was an elaborate and probably expensive way to protect his idea but it worked for decades.