Patents

Patents, Antitrust. Suppose that you live in a small farming community, Village 1, that relies entirely on its own members for food supplies. I have the only farm that grows corn. Whenever you come to me to purchase corn I tell you that I will only sell you my corn if you also buy a pound of cauliflower for every pound of corn you purchase. Cauliflower is plentiful, and you don’t want to buy my cauliflower (in fact you don’t even like this vegetable), but since you (and your fellow citizens) need corn you have no choice. Assume that you move to a new community, Village 2. You still need corn, but you discover that there are several purveyors of corn in your new town. You go to the closest of these, and you discover, to your dismay, that this farmer also insists that if you buy his corn, you must also buy his cauliflower. Before purchasing you check around, and learn that the other corn vendors do not require that you purchase cauliflower as a condition to purchasing corn, and you happily proceed to do business only with them in the future. You later learn, to your satisfaction, that the corn farmer that you first encountered in Village 2 has gone out of business. Thie simple example illustrates one of the more complex and vexing doctrines of U.S. antitrust…