Bonum Certa Men Certa

Patent Trolls Update: IPVALUE, Cypress, OIN, Open Patents, Blackbird, CATO and So-called 'Efficient Infringement'

Worm-like parasites and what is being proposed for battling them

Subway platform



Summary: A roundup of recent news about patent trolls and suggestions that have been put forth for cutting off their air supply

AS our previous post explained, hardware giants are using patents in anticompetitive ways and regulatory agencies have begun paying attention. As it turns out, based on yesterday's blog post from IAM, patent trolls are ganging up against the hardware industry too. It's noteworthy because typically -- or at least traditionally -- trolls relied a great deal on software patents -- like those that even the EPO covertly granted.



"In 1 week," wrote this person the other day, "patent trolls drain $1.5B from the US economy. Tell Congress to move on patent reform..."

This figure is somewhat controversial, but without a doubt patent trolls are a burden on society and on the industry (meaning money-making corporations, which themselves can sometimes be a burden on society). Yesterday we wrote about IBM's latest ugly lobbying effort for software patents -- an effort which coincides with IBM's attacks on smaller businesses. We kindly remind readers that it was IBM that brought power or gave rise to OIN, which was initially led by a person from IBM (Rosenthal). OIN is the IBM-led 'solution’ to a lot of the problems as envisioned by IBM, I told Benjamin Henrion yesterday, after he wrote that "OIN CEO Keith Bergelt said OIN is useless against patent trolls" (mentioned in relation to FOSDEM last weekend). "They [IBM] get to continue to sue us and pretend software patents are awesome," I told Henrion. André Rebentisch (FFII) asked Henrion: "What to make out of this?"

Henrion replied by saying "it is an old quote from ssp website [the Stop Software Patents Web site]. Dr. Stefane Fermigier added: "Rightfully so. This is asymmetric warfare."

Remember that patent trolls cannot be sued. There is nothing to sue them over and large corporations now use trolls as a sort of loophole by which to harass their competitors. It further complicates the situation and serves to show just how evil the scourge of trolls has become.

The reason much of this was brought up is this FOSDEM talk, which we mentioned a few days ago. "Slides and video of our #Open #Patents talk at #FOSDEM are now available at https://fosdem.org/2017/schedule/event/open_patents/," their official account said after the talk and the event had ended.

Henrion said he was "Watching Open Patent Office talk at Fosdem, defensive publication is useless and yet another waste of energy and time..."

"Peer-To-Patent (or Peer2Patent) failed miserably," I told Henrion, "just like OIN's equivalent effort" (which didn't even last long). We never supported the method of defensive publication, which passes a lot of the burden to the victims rather than the source of abuse.

In other news, the other day Condé Nast published this article about a new and high-profile troll case. Their trolls expert wrote:

It's been barely two months since Netflix added its long-awaited download feature, and the online streaming company has already been sued over it. The plaintiff is a company few have heard of: Blackbird Technologies, a company with no products or assets other than patents. Blackbird's business is to buy up patent rights and file lawsuits over them, a business known colloquially as "patent trolling."

Blackbird was founded by two former big-firm patent attorneys, Wendy Verlander and Chris Freeman. The organization owns US Patent No. 7,174,362, which it hopes will result in payouts from a internet video companies with offline-viewing features. On Wednesday, Blackbird (who tells potential clients about being "able to litigate at reduced costs and achieve results") filed lawsuits against Netflix (PDF), Soundcloud (PDF), Vimeo, Starz, Mubi, and Studio 3 Partners, which owns the Epix TV channel. All of the companies have some type of app that allows for downloading streamable content and watching it offline.


CATO, in the same week, wrote about the TC Heartland case -- a case which is likely to seriously weaken patent trolls later this year. Here is the summary of it:

Twelve years ago Congress passed the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005, much of whose point was to curb the then-rampant practice in class actions of national forum-shopping, that is, filing a lawsuit in whichever of many possible courts around the U.S. was most favorable to the plaintiff, whether or not the state or district associated with that court had a natural link to the underlying controversy (such as being the place where the alleged misconduct occurred or where its defendant had its base of operations). But forum-shopping remains rampant and damaging in some other areas of litigation, such as product liability: thus pharmaceutical cases get taken to California and asbestos cases to Illinois and New York even if plaintiffs have never set foot in those states. And in perhaps the best-known litigation bazaar of all, a large share of patent cases (44% in 2015) are filed in the Eastern District of Texas, centered on Marshall, Texas, a rural community far from most defendants and their headquarters, and known for its exceedingly plaintiff-friendly judges and juries. The result has been a series of large verdicts even on dubious claims of infringement, coupled with enormous pressure on defendants to settle cases they would have resisted with confidence if filed in a different, randomly chosen district.


This is the kind of thing which is likely to seriously impede further trolling, along with abolition of software patents (already happening in the US).

Sites that are funded by patent trolls don't wish to see that coming to fruition. Yesterday, for example, IAM used propaganda terms of the trolls right there in the headline ("efficient infringement", not even with scare quotes like they did some days ago). This was said in relation to Korea ( "Korean IP office boss vows crackdown on efficient infringement, but don't hold your breath") and it is worth reminding ourselves that in Korea they disallow software patents and authorities recently went after Microsoft, for essentially 'trolling' Korean giants. Maximalists like IAM are upset.

Recent Techrights' Posts

This is the Man Who's Attacking Linus Torvalds et al in "a Disease" (Social Control Media)
One thing that Richard M. Stallman and Torvalds can agree on is that Social Control Media should be avoided
Unlike GAFAM, Free Software Serves You, It Does Not Serve Governments and MElons (Overlapping Forces)
Tired of oligarchy controlling your life through gadgets and "apps"?
When It Comes to Social Control Media, Linus Torvalds is Channeling Techrights
GAFAM workers know exactly who to aim at
New EPO Paper: Promoting (Rewarding) People Who Grant Many Illegal European Patents to Make More Money (at Europeans' Expense) While Patent Courts in the EU Are Themselves Illegal
now the coup is sort of complete and even the "courts" are part of the corruption
Slopwatch: Carnival of LLM Slop and FUD Spewed by Bots, Pasted in by MaKenna Hensley and Day
Welcome to the Web in 2025. Articles about "Linux", "Security", and the Web (e.g. "Firefox") are fake.
Links 07/02/2025: Amazon’s Stock Collapses and US Government Being Dismantled (Still)
Links for the day
 
Microsoft Windows Falls to 12% in Myanmar
Remember that Microsoft is virtually 0% in mobile
Gemini Links 08/02/2025: "Thought Leaders" and Returns to Gemini Protocol
Links for the day
Links 08/02/2025: MElon Coup, Mass Layoffs at Facebook, and PlayStation Network Down
Links for the day
On Wars Against Founders
We need to insist that founders remain
Links 08/02/2025: News Corp Admits Traffic Declines, Wildlife Trafficking Tackled
Links for the day
Gemini Links 08/02/2025: Lamp and Notions
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, February 07, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, February 07, 2025
Gemini Links 07/02/2025: Mid-level Details and Simple Code
Links for the day
Links 07/02/2025: US 'Demolition Crew', e-ID Loopholes, and Sanctions
Links for the day
Professor Eben Moglen on How Social Control Media Metabolises Humans and Constrains Freedom of Thought
Nothing of value would be lost if all these data-harvesting giants (profiling people) vanished overnight
Social Control Media is Narcissism
Nowadays there's a lot more literature and even press coverage explaining the harms of Social Control Media
Debian Left Twitter (MElon "X"), We Think the Free Software Foundation (FSF) Should Do the Same
What would the FSF really lose if it stopped posting there?
statCounter Sees GNU/Linux Share Doubling in China Over the Past Year
It'll be interesting to see what data in the coming months shows
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, February 06, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, February 06, 2025
Richard Stallman (RMS) Confirms Next Week's Talk in Europe
He gave at least 2 talks in Europe last month
Nationalism As A Service (NaaS) by Microsoft Azure, Gutting the US Government for Profit
Will Microsoft be receiving bailouts as a reward for all this?
Rumours of IBM Layoffs Apparently Confirmed Yesterday, IBM Canada Consulting Impacted (as Rumoured)
when IBM has layoffs we must also read it as Red Hat layoffs
Tons of Anti-Linux 'Articles' Published by Bots (LLMs), Maybe Microsoft's
Upon closer inspection, all this FUD turned out to be LLM garbage
Gemini Links 06/02/2025: Voicemail Sucks and Night of Lights
Links for the day
Ubuntu Desktop Director of Engineering Has Only One Blog Post. It Promotes Microsoft Windows.
Remember that even 15 years ago (more or less, maybe 16 years ago) Canonical appointed a a 'former' Microsoft manager (Spencer) to lead Ubuntu on the desktop
Links 06/02/2025: YouTube Takedowns Out of Control, 'DOGE' Breaking Laws
Links for the day
IBM Red Hat on "era of cloud computing", pushing "hey hi" (AI) hype in Microsoft Azure
LLM slop might actually be more benign than Microsoft promotion
Corruption and Rule-Breaking Prevail at the European Patent Office (EPO), Europe's Second-Largest Institution
The law does not really exist at the EPO; it can be perceived as merely a "recommendation"
statCounter: More Countries Where Windows is Around 1% "Market Share" (People Have Moved to Android/Linux)
in some nations Windows is already 1% or less
404 Media Says "Workers at NASA Told to Drop Everything to Scrub Mentions of Indigenous People, Women from Its Websites" But There's Also Accessibility in the Firing Line
In the case of abandoning accessibility, everyone stands to be hurt and proprietary software can be brought in to replace standards
When BetaNews Writes Real Articles About "Linux" They Promote Windows
The Web is in a bad state. We need to at least try to correct this.
Gemini Links 06/02/2025: Cynicism and "Real Magic on the C64"
Links for the day
Links 06/02/2025: New Sanctions, Layoffs, and Executive Orders
Links for the day
Distros and Desktop Environments, Devices
GNU/Linux focused
New Rumours of IBM Layoffs in 2025, IBM Consulting Still Struggles, Based on Management
"Hey hi" (AI) has been a common excuse for business failure
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, February 05, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, February 05, 2025