I understand the emotion, and I share it. The longest it would take to make any significant government change where there is broad citizen support is 8 years, that is four congressional election cycles, two presidential, and one senate cycle. It might take 10 if the senate cycle lands poorly.

Let's use the Tea Partiers who are currently driving us off into some fiscal unknowns. A large enough constituent of people was of the opinion that the Federal Government had gotten too big and was fiscally out of control. Their efforts managed to elect a parliamentary significant number of them to congress where they have been generally voting as a bloc against additional taxes without significant spending cuts. Whether you and I agree with them, that agenda is moving forward. It went from whine to change in less than 10 years. (I count the start of that movement around 2005/6, how about you?)

So that patent system is broken, its been broken for a long time, but until patent-a-geddon here, it never rose to the attention of anyone outside of tech circles (and like it or not we're both a relatively small and (historically) a relatively ineffective political force). And yet patent-a-geddon has put it on the radar of politicians, and big time donors like Google and Bill & Melinda Gates have been bending the ears of said politicians and for the first time in my memory we're seeing actual changes to the way the patent system works (America INVENTS act) and more critical scrutiny on both the PTO and on the federal court in Washington that hears the appeals. That is all good news and indicative that change is happening.

2014 is going to be another election year. A number of people will put their names in the hat to be your congressional representative. If you don't like what your incumbent is doing with regard to patents, talk to the contenders and see if there is any one of them that will both support your desired changes to the patent system and their personal goals aren't too distasteful. If you live somewhere like the Bay Area there are a bunch of congressional districts in the area, you can talk to lots of folks. Try to get your entire state's congressional delegation lined up around fixing patents in the next two years. To do that you will need to research some ways in which the patent system should be changed (if you want to advocate the abolishment of software patents then it helps to look at other places that have done that, they have a history you can reference). Talk to some outspoken supporters and critics of the Patent system, find out how they rationalize their position, can you argue successfully against that rationalization? Find their arguments and their evidence and see where it leads you.

None of this takes money, but it does take time and effort. Its a crap load of work, much of it fairly clerical and boring. Get other people involved (from your congressional district is the most impactful but from all over is okay too). You are going to ask a representative to stand up and say "we need to make these changes ..." and they need facts to back that up, they need counterpoints to the arguments that will be thrown in their face, they need to know who is going to come after them, and they need to know what is at stake. Your congressional representative is your tool for manipulating the Government to your will, that is their job.

Recognize too that you are but one pusher in a sea of pushers, pushing from the home district gets +1 to impact because you're a voter but there are other pushers out there. Find them and blunt their story.

And that takes time of course. Less if you have money and you can hire clerical staff, more if you run down everything yourself.

Or don't. Your choice. FWIW the voter registrar will have the names and addresses of the folks who are putting their name in the hat for Congress usually in November of this year but no later than March[1] of next year. Get the names and go talk to them. They will be happy to talk to you if they are trying to get elected.

[1] http://fec.gov - "When are the Federal Election Activity periods for my state?

Within 120 days before an election, voter registration, voter identification, get-out-the-vote and generic campaign activities conducted by state, district or local party committees are considered federal election activity (FEA) and must be financed using federal funds, Levin funds or a combination of the two. As states establish their election schedules (including special elections), the Commission calculates the applicable FEA periods."