Thursday, February 28, 2013
#10: Trolls
Yesterday, Gregory Ferenstein, posted an article in TechCrunch called “Law
Would Force Patent Trolls To Pay For Failed Lawsuits Against Innovators,”
in which he discussed some ways in which law makers hope to deter patent
trolls. I thought I would summarize this article because we talked about
defining exactly what a patent troll does. Patent trolls buy up patents they
did not produce themselves and sue companies who infringe those patents as well
as companies who do not. They are considered “trolls” because their profit
platform is based on returns from law suits. According to the article lawmakers
decided higher penalties for entities that abuse the patent system may bring
this “troll-like” behavior to a halt. According to the article a bipartisan
bill, called SHEILD, has been proposed to “force so-called patent trolls, those
who hoard patents for the sole purpose of suing innovators, to pay the legal
costs if their frivolous patent lawsuits fail in court.” The act is supported
by many major tech companies as these companies do not add any economic benefit
to the country. Apparently, trolls account for “61% of all patent disputes!”
The president as well as the new chair of the House Judiciary Committee are in
full support of the plan. People that disagree with the bill. Alexander
Poltorak, CEO of General Patent Corporation, argues that SHIELD Act supporters
are overestimating the amount of lawsuits that are driven by trolls and claims
that the act “was designed to ‘intimidate patent owners whose IP rights are
routinely infringed by corporate bullies.’” The SHEILD Act will be changing its
requirements soon to encompass not only the tech firms but all other industries
as well. Ultimately, the act would create a “loser’s pay” system to deter unnecessary.
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“loser’s pay” system to deter unnecessary litigation make a lot sense. However, if that's the case the patent can not be use as the tactic for corporations. Apple’s patent cases against Samsung were a tactic to curb the explosive growth of the Galaxy.
ReplyDeleteThe proposal sounds like a good idea, but one of the main problems with it would be defining who is a patent troll and who is not. A company could just as easily argue that they were genuinely suing a company because they believed there was infringement on one of their purchased patents. In other words, the line between troll and legitimate might become blurry in some instances.
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