I'm not sure I understand what exactly your arguments for the usability of patents is. I understand you argue RSA was a boon for e-commerce because encryption was a boon for e-commerce. This is true, encryption enabled e-commerce. However, I do not see how patents helped and it looks to me like you made no argument to support that point. Your argument seems to be "RSA built crypto, crypto is useful, RSA had patents, ergo - patents are useful". Such argument is a non-sequitur. And nowhere you proved that "it happened via patents", meaning that patents were necessary for the creation of e-commerce, not just a means for some people to extract some rent from something that would have happened anyway.
John Nash's example is not exactly relevant as in 1955 there was not much to do with encryption - modern e-commerce could not exist back then because there was no supporting technology (like personal computing, widely deployed broadband networks, etc.) to enable it. There are many examples of things invented before it was their time and forgotten, only to be re-discovered later with much success. Specifically, the history of cryptography is ripe with examples of cyphers invented, forgotten, reinvented and re-forgotten, and being misunderstood and mis-applied by powers using it.
You proceed to argue that patents are short. This argument seems to me deficient in two ways. First, if patents are so beneficial, why it is good that they are short? Why not have more of a good thing? Second, the example of copyright and the Mickey Mouse protection laws stretching copyright durations well beyond the original lengths show us that it is much easier to extend the length of the rent-extraction period than keep it short. The only reason why it has not happened yet is that the interested parties do not have enough political clout, and the speed of innovation has been enough that even the relatively short times we have now are enough to extract sufficient rent (with pharma, movement to extension is already happening). However, if the innovation slows down and the clout raises, we will have the same term extensions we have now with copyrights.
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I'm not sure I understand what exactly your arguments for the usability of patents is. I understand you argue RSA was a boon for e-commerce because encryption was a boon for e-commerce. This is true, encryption enabled e-commerce. However, I do not see how patents helped and it looks to me like you made no argument to support that point. Your argument seems to be "RSA built crypto, crypto is useful, RSA had patents, ergo - patents are useful". Such argument is a non-sequitur. And nowhere you proved that "it happened via patents", meaning that patents were necessary for the creation of e-commerce, not just a means for some people to extract some rent from something that would have happened anyway.
John Nash's example is not exactly relevant as in 1955 there was not much to do with encryption - modern e-commerce could not exist back then because there was no supporting technology (like personal computing, widely deployed broadband networks, etc.) to enable it. There are many examples of things invented before it was their time and forgotten, only to be re-discovered later with much success. Specifically, the history of cryptography is ripe with examples of cyphers invented, forgotten, reinvented and re-forgotten, and being misunderstood and mis-applied by powers using it.
You proceed to argue that patents are short. This argument seems to me deficient in two ways. First, if patents are so beneficial, why it is good that they are short? Why not have more of a good thing? Second, the example of copyright and the Mickey Mouse protection laws stretching copyright durations well beyond the original lengths show us that it is much easier to extend the length of the rent-extraction period than keep it short. The only reason why it has not happened yet is that the interested parties do not have enough political clout, and the speed of innovation has been enough that even the relatively short times we have now are enough to extract sufficient rent (with pharma, movement to extension is already happening). However, if the innovation slows down and the clout raises, we will have the same term extensions we have now with copyrights.