Off topic...sort of...one of my husband's professors was once involved in a research project to develop a new form of wallboard to put up in home construction. The team developed a form that was cheaper, lighter to carry, better at insulating and more ecologically friendly than the existing wallboard "biggie." He found out later that the entire project had been funded by the company that created the most used wallboard. They took all of the patents and stuck them in a drawer so that contractors would continue to go on using the expensive and inferior product they were currently producing. The professor theorizes that somewhere there is a warehouse where all the patents for all the things that would save consumers money and protect the environment are kept to prevent anyone from actually building them.
Just another reason to be "Proud to be an American," I guess.
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