Alan Minsk's guest post on Patentlyo touches on some important issues in an ongoing discussion about increasing transparency in the patent marketplace. The contention floating around the patent blog-o-sphere is that lack of transparency in the patent sale and licensing process can easily lead to inefficiency, ineffectiveness, and--possibly--injustice.

Minsk does a great job of teasing out the central issue in this discussion: is the patent marketplace a part of the patent system? If so, to what degree should it become government-regulated? If not, are we ready to live with the consequences of malicious, non-transparent licensing behavior that will result?