dmiller, I don't agree with your statement.
---It's like anything else, when there's demand for patents, the price goes up. when there's not, the price goes down---
Supply drives demand in the physical world. (Steve Jobs executed on this fact) But IP is a different animal. The idea/concept is readily available to the world and therefore can be used/stolen and provide no benefit to the originator/inventor. Without an effective system in place to protect the value of the IP the supply-demand equation is skewed. There may be plenty of demand but no affect on the price if the IP is not protected.