I think it's instructive to look away from the world of operating systems, which have been under legal threat since the 80's and thus have always been under an anti-competitive, anti-innovative shadow. The fact that so few companies tried what Apple did with UI speaks as much to the intimidation inherent in the industry than to Steve Job's genius.
Whenever I ask myself if patents are necessary to promote innovation, I think of music software, where copying is a fact of life yet highly original ideas emerge year after year. Whenever something useful emerges (like Ableton Live's once innovative "session view" where you launch repeating music clips) it's usually copied by half the industry within a few versions and nobody even blinks.
In the mean time, the biggest incumbents (Avid's Pro Tools, Steinberg's Cubase) have remained seemingly profitable businesses, and consumers have benefited from abundant choice. The competition has also encouraged the software makers to add a lot of value in the form of lots of included content (soft synths, effects, loops, etc.). And funny enough, the more innovative companies (Ableton, Propellerhead, Cycling 74 spring to mind) keep coming up with interesting ideas.
Whenever I ask myself if patents are necessary to promote innovation, I think of music software, where copying is a fact of life yet highly original ideas emerge year after year. Whenever something useful emerges (like Ableton Live's once innovative "session view" where you launch repeating music clips) it's usually copied by half the industry within a few versions and nobody even blinks.
In the mean time, the biggest incumbents (Avid's Pro Tools, Steinberg's Cubase) have remained seemingly profitable businesses, and consumers have benefited from abundant choice. The competition has also encouraged the software makers to add a lot of value in the form of lots of included content (soft synths, effects, loops, etc.). And funny enough, the more innovative companies (Ableton, Propellerhead, Cycling 74 spring to mind) keep coming up with interesting ideas.