Patent Summary

A patent is a property right, granted by a government, and gives inventors sole rights to their invention and excludes others from making, using, distributing, exporting, or importing that invention, for a limited time.
The original purpose of patents was to promote and encouage the development of new inventions by providing the inverntor protection for their invention for a set period of time.
Patents are granted for 20 years, with the exception of design patents, which are granted for only 14 years. Some pharmaceutical patents can be extended.
Patents expire to encourage competition between companies, thereby reducing sale prices for items. Patents exist for the period they do to allow the inventor to capitalize on his/her hard work.

Taro Bean Patent Controversy:
In Hawaii, the Taro plant was once dying out. The Hawaiians went to a UH faculty member for help. The UH facult member interbred 3 different chains od Taro, from Hawaii, Palau, and other places. This was done with traditional methods, and was not genetically modified. Five years later, demonstrators said that these plants would go out and kill Hawaiian Taro. They also objected to the UH "owning" Taro, as they viewed it as tantamount to owning an ancestor.