Hi there! I kept reloading to avoid the Start-up on the Rise event, which annoyed me because I'm playing as a socialist star nation which I feel wouldn't have start-ups or patents, both IMO very capitalist concepts. I finally decided to edit the files to try and comment the whole event out, but instead I had an idea to add a fourth option that did nothing but conclude the event so I could get around it.

The more I looked into it, though, the more I thought that was kind of boring, so I decided to give my fourth option a small benefit. Being an explicit rejection of the idea of patents and intellectual property generally, which I believe would enable more frequent advancements in science and culture since the threat of legal consequences for building off of someone else's work would be gone, I added a static modifier empire-wide that would give a permanent 1% monthly multiplier to all three types of research (to represent scientific works) plus unity (to represent cultural works). Since there are three types of research, I decided to make the unity modifier 3% so it would have a roughly equal impact on both categories. I named the new modifier "Against Intellectual Monopoly", the title of an academic text from Cambridge University Press arguing against IP law written by Michele Boldrin and David Levine. I thought it was a clever reference.

Given that this is now a more substantial boost, I added a downside of the Disgruntled Innovator planetary modifier, but for 5 years instead of 15. The idea here is that you've denied the innovator the patent, but not then encouraged other people to use those same discoveries which would have diluted the innovator's profile for their discoveries, so they're still unhappy but not as insulted as if you'd gone "hey everybody, use this person's research and compete with them for further achievements!" The faction isn't upset, because being a faction there will be some members who like the idea of IP law and other members who won't, and you haven't insulted the innovator directly like in the other option. In this way, I hoped to write a compelling but not overpowered bonus which was balanced by a short-term disadvantage.

I also changed the name and description of the event to remove references to a start-up; I renamed the event "Patent Potential" (I like wordplay) and changed the term "high-tech start-up" to "specialized research group", which is left open as to whether it's privately- or publicly-funded, so it should fit any kind of star nation.

I don't necessarily know the best way to get this to you, but I thought I'd offer my modified files to anyone maintaining this mod in case these changes sounded interesting or fun and you wanted to consider adding them to this mod in an update. I don't know anything about how the rest of the mod works, so I wouldn't be in a position to maintain a fork of it myself. I'd be happy to see my work get out past my own game, and I'd be delighted with a credit for my small contribution on the mod page, if that's an option.

If this sounds interesting, please let me know!