Comment by StefanKarpinski

How can any article about this issue not mention the word "patent" anywhere? Why is a 1970s technology still under patent? Patents are supposed to allow recouping of R & D costs, not grant an effectively permanent monopoly that can be sold over and over again until someone greedy enough does the inevitable – if we grant that sort of long-lived monopoly, what else can we possibly expect to happen? Reform the broken patent system and this problem vanishes due to natural competition. This patent reform isn't even a hard one: stop allowing patents to get extended indefinitely (with or without minor modifications).