An article by Anne Broache, Staff Writer, CNET News.com, discusses some bills in the USA that aim to reduce the massive failures in the US patent system.
Improvements: First to file to match international patent community, creation of a "post-grant opposition" board to more cheaply weed out poor quality patents, restrict acceptable venues for filing patent suits, and reducing remedies able to be claimed against "infringers".
Much of the debate shows the very different economic climates in different subject matter, which partly suggests that the "one size fits all" attitude in patent law is inappropriate. Each subject matter area should have separate economic analysis, leading to different rules. One rule should be the exclusion of information/mental processes from patentability which have been shown to be a chill against rather than an incentive for innovation.
Even the NYT is publishing pro-patent-reform articles
See my posting.