https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/08/apple-samsung-should-fight-battle-in-marketplace

Our patent system is intended to incentivize innovation, in theory at least. Lately it’s become little more than a tool to squelch competition, and it’s not just the Apples and the Samsungs of the world who find themselves fighting these battles. It’s also small and innovative companies, local governments, foreign companies trying to make it in America, hobbyists, and even individual developers. The problems are particularly acute in the world of software: it turns out that software patents are nearly five times more likely to be the subject of litigation as other patents. In fact, lawsuits surrounding software patents have more than tripled since 1999.

Apple v. Samsung is not the problem in itself, but it’s a symptom of a broken system.