Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

isn't patent trolling more damaging to our economy and progress than regulations? granted, patents are a regulation...

Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Crap on a stick, I thought I was gonna be rich...

Some begging the question in the analysis...
Regarding money:

* From 1990 - 2010 NPE lawsuits are associated with $500 billion dollars of lost wealth to defendants.
* In the past four years, NPE lawsuits are associated with an average of $80 billion per year of lost wealth to defendants.
* Very little of this loss wealth represents a transfer to inventors.

Reading that, you'd think that they're saying that defendants lose this money and it goes to the patent trolls, rather than the inventors. But they're not... they're measuring this "lost wealth" by stock price declines during the few days following a lawsuit being filed. It's not transferred to anyone - it's investors jumping ship and/or reducing their earnings expectations.

The same could be said of any lawsuit, however. By this logic, corporations should be immune from suit, because any lawsuit results in lots of lost wealth to defendants.

They also don't account for lost wealth to inventors or patent owners for ongoing infringement. Instead, the entire analysis is defendant-focused, which necessarily leads to the questionable conclusion that no lawsuit, of any type, can be valid.

/their paper's also a bit out of date. One of the causes they point to is the fact that trolls can file a suit against multiple unrelated defendants... but they can't anymore, as a result of the recent patent reform act.

ShawnDoc: In the case of our company, it seems like we're getting sued daily based on implementing IEEE and other industry standards in our products using off the shelf hardware. Often the patents very clearly have NOTHING to actually do with our products, but I'm guessing the trolls hope that we can't afford to take the case to court and instead will just settle out of court to make the lawsuit go away.

Yup, same with "copyright infringement". Well, until the Federal marshals were sent after Righthaven.

Virulency: isn't patent trolling more damaging to our economy and progress than regulations? granted, patents are a regulation...

Lack of regulation is damaging as well -- just look at Wall Street, Enron, Worldcom, etc. etc.

Need a Dispenser Here: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Crap on a stick, I thought I was gonna be rich...

I invented the stick, so...

Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

2CountyFairs: Need a Dispenser Here: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Crap on a stick, I thought I was gonna be rich...

I invented the stick, so...

Im a cow, so---- BONK ,THUD

syberpud: ShawnDoc: In the case of our company, it seems like we're getting sued daily based on implementing IEEE and other industry standards in our products using off the shelf hardware. Often the patents very clearly have NOTHING to actually do with our products, but I'm guessing the trolls hope that we can't afford to take the case to court and instead will just settle out of court to make the lawsuit go away.

Yup, same with "copyright infringement". Well, until the Federal marshals were sent after Righthaven.

Judicious (no pun intended) application of court sanctions could deter particularly egregious patent trolls. It worked against the ADA jackasses in Florida.

the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids



I invented the internet. Pay me, biatches.

// direct quote

What article seems to ignore is that NPE's include such "patent trolls" as MIT, Cal Tech, University of Wisconsin, ... Your college tuition just doubled folks. Also kiss most partially sponsored grad work in the bio sciences and engineering goodbye.

sdd2000: What article seems to ignore is that NPE's include such "patent trolls" as MIT, Cal Tech, University of Wisconsin, ... Your college tuition just doubled folks. Also kiss most partially sponsored grad work in the bio sciences and engineering goodbye.

Yeah. Any solution for getting rid of trolls has to also protect research universities, because they do a lot of good work.

Best solution - base damages on existing license fees or, if the product is currently unlicensed, on expert testimony of what reasonable license fees would be.
Currently, damages can be based on the profits of the defendant, which can be both huge, and only tangentially related to the infringement. A patent that covers some minor part of a language conversion utility in Microsoft Office may be worth a few pennies per copy, but isn't worth a hundred dollars per copy.

the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

And how did all of you cook that burger? As the inventor of fire, I expect a royalty on every burger.

I invented the patent troll so I am really getting rich off this idea...

hstein3: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

And how did all of you cook that burger? As the inventor of fire, I expect a royalty on every burger.

You all need to talk to my lawyer, I have a patent for energy.

the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

LazarusLong42: hstein3: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

And how did all of you cook that burger? As the inventor of fire, I expect a royalty on every burger.

You all need to talk to my lawyer, I have a patent for energy.

Sure, that's fine, once I get mine for my patent of The English Language.

My father invented the question mark.

quickdraw: rpm: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

I invented inventing. So there.

Try the process of inventing without covalent bonds, I dare ya

rpm: quickdraw: rpm: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

I invented inventing. So there.

Try the process of inventing without covalent bonds, I dare ya

As the inventor of enthalpy and entropy, I assert that covalent bonds are obvious to a practitioner in the field and therefore your patent should be invalidated.

ChubbyTiger: rpm: quickdraw: rpm: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

I invented inventing. So there.

Try the process of inventing without covalent bonds, I dare ya

As the inventor of enthalpy and entropy, I assert that covalent bonds are obvious to a practitioner in the field and therefore your patent should be invalidated.

Amateurs. I invented Planck's constant.

FrancoFile: ChubbyTiger: rpm: quickdraw: rpm: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

I invented inventing. So there.

Try the process of inventing without covalent bonds, I dare ya

As the inventor of enthalpy and entropy, I assert that covalent bonds are obvious to a practitioner in the field and therefore your patent should be invalidated.

Amateurs. I invented Planck's constant.

Before you attempt to remove the motes/specks from the amateurs' eyes, try removing the Planck from your own eye first.

/rimshot

ChubbyTiger: rpm: quickdraw: rpm: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

I invented inventing. So there.

Try the process of inventing without covalent bonds, I dare ya

As the inventor of enthalpy and entropy, I assert that covalent bonds are obvious to a practitioner in the field and therefore your patent should be invalidated.

I invented physics. So about those royalties....

/It was my idea! I invented it and I want five of them!
//There such a strong chance you will never get that one, unless I'm not the only one that played that game.

///Also counting down till a guy with the fark handle Cave Johnson comes in claiming he invented science.

dTheaetetus: Reading that, you'd think that they're saying that defendants lose this money and it goes to the patent trolls, rather than the inventors. But they're not... they're measuring this "lost wealth" by stock price declines during the few days following a lawsuit being filed. It's not transferred to anyone - it's investors jumping ship and/or reducing their earnings expectations.

The same could be said of any lawsuit, however. By this logic, corporations should be immune from suit, because any lawsuit results in lots of lost wealth to defendants.

I'm not a lawyer, but it sounds like you've only read the executive summary. The first thing the authors do (in Literature Review, section 1.1) is make a convincing case that patent lawsuits brought by NPEs yield comparatively less social good than lawsuits brought by practicing entities, and that the patents held by NPEs are of dubious quality.

What I got from section 1.1:

1) Lawsuits filed by NPEs have tripled between 2002 and 2009.

2) Many of these lawsuits involve multiple defendants (which we know is no allowed, but it gives insight into the objectives of NPEs).

3) NPEs are more likely than PEs to prosecute very old patents

4) NPE patent lawsuits brought to judgement resulted in 54% of all claims being invalidated and 44% of some claims being invalidated

5) NPEs tend to lose lawsuits far more often than PEs

I don't know about you, but this data suggests to me that most NPEs are not responsible entities. It's a shame they didn't break down the data by additional classes of NPEs.

All they're doing is quantifying the effect of patent lawsuits on a company's value. The conclusion then follows: if those lawsuits are frivolous then the loss in value is due to patent trolling. You try telling those stockholders they didn't loose any wealth when their stock price drops by 5%. Also, the paper points out that there is little to no evidence that patent lawsuits by NPEs actually improve innovation, so all of these lawsuits aren't getting anyone anything.

It's true that they don't talk about the recent changes to patent law, but that's irrelevant. As I said above, they're only trying to quantify the effect of patent lawsuits on stock prices, and all the data that's available was gathered under the previous law. The lawsuits that are filed with multiple defendants were typically over-broad patents targeting huge companies anyway. This might protect the little guys from litigation, but it's still not going to stop NPEs from suing Google and Microsoft separately.

Is the "jack shiat and go fark yourself" thing a reference I'm missing?

Fubini: I'm not a lawyer, but it sounds like you've only read the executive summary. The first thing the authors do (in Literature Review, section 1.1) is make a convincing case that patent lawsuits brought by NPEs yield comparatively less social good than lawsuits brought by practicing entities, and that the patents held by NPEs are of dubious quality.

No, no, read the whole thing. My point is that their conclusion doesn't necessarily from from their data on lost wealth. I actually think their conclusion has some reasonable points, and there are avenues for reform that would help... but saying that because a stock price went down, therefore inventors aren't benefited seems to be out of left field.

Zachs Kappler: ChubbyTiger: rpm: quickdraw: rpm: the_sidewinder: Unoriginal_Username: Current Resident: Need a Dispenser Here: Because People in power are Stupid: I invented the cheeseburger.

Now give me my millions.

I invented the Hamburger. You just put something else on it.

Give ME my millions.

I invented ground beef which you form into a patty to create your Hamburger.

Give me MY millions.

Ahem..you would all be screwed if it hadn't been for me creating the cow

I would like to see you all in court, I invented DNA and phospholipids

I invented covalent bonds, pay up.

I invented inventing. So there.

Try the process of inventing without covalent bonds, I dare ya

As the inventor of enthalpy and entropy, I assert that covalent bonds are obvious to a practitioner in the field and therefore your patent should be invalidated.

I invented physics. So about those royalties....

/It was my idea! I invented it and I want five of them!
//There such a strong chance you will never get that one, unless I'm not the only one that played that game.

Screw all of you, I invented lawyers.

Theaetetus: Fubini: I'm not a lawyer, but it sounds like you've only read the executive summary. The first thing the authors do (in Literature Review, section 1.1) is make a convincing case that patent lawsuits brought by NPEs yield comparatively less social good than lawsuits brought by practicing entities, and that the patents held by NPEs are of dubious quality.

No, no, read the whole thing. My point is that their conclusion doesn't necessarily from from their data on lost wealth. I actually think their conclusion has some reasonable points, and there are avenues for reform that would help... but saying that because a stock price went down, therefore inventors aren't benefited seems to be out of left field.

The way I read it, the stock price went down and stayed permanently depressed, even after judgement. That represents a serious loss of wealth to these companies and their shareholders. Combine that with the statistic that over 50% of these cases end up failing to substantiate even one claim of infringement, that's a lot of pointless loss of wealth.

Fubini: Theaetetus: Fubini: I'm not a lawyer, but it sounds like you've only read the executive summary. The first thing the authors do (in Literature Review, section 1.1) is make a convincing case that patent lawsuits brought by NPEs yield comparatively less social good than lawsuits brought by practicing entities, and that the patents held by NPEs are of dubious quality.

No, no, read the whole thing. My point is that their conclusion doesn't necessarily from from their data on lost wealth. I actually think their conclusion has some reasonable points, and there are avenues for reform that would help... but saying that because a stock price went down, therefore inventors aren't benefited seems to be out of left field.

The way I read it, the stock price went down and stayed permanently depressed, even after judgement. That represents a serious loss of wealth to these companies and their shareholders. Combine that with the statistic that over 50% of these cases end up failing to substantiate even one claim of infringement, that's a lot of pointless loss of wealth.

Yes, but you can't really blame patents for that unless:
(i) the same dip doesn't happen with any other type of lawsuit; and
(ii) the previously-increased stock price doesn't represent ill gotten gains due to their illegal infringement.

Additionally, since half of the data points - e.g. 50% of the cases - say something entirely different than the other half, it's tough to draw a conclusion since, by definition, it's undermined by half the data.