Bonum Certa Men Certa

Cheating the US Patent System is a Lot Harder After TC Heartland

Some gambling dice



Summary: Some new examples of tricks (and sometimes cheats) attempted by patent claimants and their representatives; it does not go as well as they hoped

THE level of mischief at the USPTO is occasionally noted here; it's typically about law firms and patent trolls who are attempting to game the system.



Over the past week we have gathered numerous new examples. We don't mean to bash the USPTO (we are actually very encouraged to see its improvements in recent years) but merely to take stock of areas of improvement for the patent system (including courts and law firms).

TC Heartland or another case of Cray are often mentioned in relation to venue shifting or forum shopping or whatever one calls it (it's about filing one's patent lawsuit in a district which is perceived to be plaintiff-friendly, troll-friendly, or friendly towards particular types of patents).

Many lawyers are patently just liars (what they're paid for) and would lie about where businesses are based. Some days ago we saw this docket report about a case in which claimed "damages" are insubstantial:

The court denied plaintiff's motion for a preliminary injunction to preclude the sales of the accused fracking system because plaintiff failed to establish irreparable harm through loss of market share or reputation.


More interesting, however, was this docket report. It's a case in which venue shifting is attempted. "The court granted defendant's alternative motion to transfer for improper venue because defendant did not have a regular and established place of business through its provision of equipment to customers in the district," it says. Rightly so. Is this another TC Heartland-type case (only at a far lower court)?

A story which received a lot more attention concerned the filing date and this docket report explained it as follows:

The court granted defendant's motion to dismiss all but three of plaintiff's patent infringement claims for claim preclusion, including claims for a patent that issued after the filing date of the parties' earlier lawsuit.


Another failed attempt to cheat the patent system and assert patents which were not even granted (yet)? Mr. Hricik, which covers ethical issues in patent law, wrote about it as well:

Normally, claim preclusion only bars later assertion of a claim only if (a) the plaintiff could have brought that claim when it filed an earlier suit and (b) the later-asserted claim is the “same” as a claim in the first case (courts take different approaches to how closely related the later claim must be to the first, but the federal rule is to look at whether the later-asserted claim arises out of the same operative facts as the earlier claim). So, normally, if a patent issues to the plaintiff after the first suit is filed, claim preclusion wouldn’t apply because of the first step: you can’t sue for infringement until the patent issues (with the narrow exception of seeking “provisional damages” for infringement under Section 154).


Hricik previously wrote about patent 'scams' wherein one party used non-existent patents to bully someone else. Trolls tend to do so too; sometimes, there's a similar issue pertaining to assignment (parties claiming to 'own' patents which they don't). One new example was covered a short while ago by Sean D. Damon (Finnegan) and also by Watchtroll.

Any time law firms pull dirty tricks such as these they merely discredit the very system they rely on. It's a form of mockery, not just misuse. They ought to collectively refrain from doing that because they spit in the very well they drink from.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Banned evidence: Ars Technica forums censored email predicting DebConf23 death, Abraham Raji & Debian cover-up
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Intimidation, Threats, and Bullying Not Tolerated by Techrights
When it comes to our reporting, safety always comes first
Something to Celebrate in Gemini Protocol
More capsules and users join in
 
Gemini Links 29/03/2025: Art of Looking, Wireguard, EMacs
Links for the day
Links 29/03/2025: Attacks on Social Security and War Updates
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, March 28, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, March 28, 2025
A World Without Rules
We're long insisted on better laws and actual enforcement of them (applicable to all, not selectively applied)
IBM's BS (Bait, Switch) Regarding Ways to Stay Onboard
PIPs, RTOs, and forced relocations are just an illusion of choice (or ability to recover)
statCounter Sees Microsoft Windows Falling to New, Unprecedented Lows in Palau
Taking Android into account, Windows is now down to an all-time low of 14%
Google News Lost the Fight to LLM Slop (While Google Itself Sells Slop, Nowadays Under the Name "Gemini")
Many people say that "Google is getting worse"; that's almost an understatement
Links 28/03/2025: AirAsia Trouble Again, UMich Culls All DEI Programs
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/03/2025: Alexa is for Gullible People, Rant About Feature Overload
Links for the day
The SLAPPs From the Microsoft Strangler (and Sidekick) No Better Than Patent Trolling
one must never settle with trolls
Links 28/03/2025: Last Reminder "to Delete Your 23andMe Data", "UK's First Permanent Facial Recognition Cameras Installed"
Links for the day
Microsoft Canonical Continues Its FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) Campaign, Reveals Google Too Sponsored It
They're paid-for lies from a Chinese company that takes GAFAM money to write puff pieces about them
Android Rises Above 76% in Mozambique, Leaving Windows in the Dust
Windows may soon be measured as smaller than Apple's iOS
IBM, Red Hat and Microsoft Probably Also Manipulate Metrics (It Helps Con the Shareholders)
Wall Street's credibility will depend on enforcement of "checks and balances"
Slopwatch: trendhunter.com and Other Pure Junk From "Google News"
The need to vet sources is hardly new; anyone can spew out anything, anywhere. There's a need for vetting.
Gemini Links 28/03/2025: Rewatching The X-Files, Slop Concerns, and NOSTR Censorship
Links for the day
Links 28/03/2025: Australia at Risk, EPO Grants Illegal Patents With Illegal Effect
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, March 27, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, March 27, 2025
Links 27/03/2025: Obituary to a Shop, Russia Trying to Buy Time
Links for the day
Links 27/03/2025: Slop, Autosuggestions, and Nostr
Links for the day
Apparently Confirmed: IBM Layoffs in Canada Today, Hundreds Affected
Impacting "177 people", says one person, "in Ottawa"
When Windows Was Dominant (1990s) Browser Monopoly Meant MSIE, But Now Google Android is Dominant and the Web in a 'Webapps' Era Works With (or Is Designed for) Chrome-isms
We've been there before
Slopwatch: BetaNews, LinuxSecurity.com, and the Attack on Web Search Using Fake and Likely Plagiarised Pages
Changing a few words here and there won't change the fact that it's not properly authored
Links 27/03/2025: U.S. Honeybee Deaths Reach Record High, Legal Occupation Next in Line After War on Science
Links for the day
Using Courts for 'Revenge' is Always a Losing Strategy
Trying to cause someone you dislike to spend a lot of money
IBM CFO James Kavanaugh Refers to Firing of Almost 10,000 Americans as "Workforce Rebalancing" (Shifting IBM's Centre of Balance to Low-salary Contracts/Countries)
The scale of IBM layoffs is getting too large to evade WARN Notices
[Video] Dr. Richard Stallman's Keynote Speech in Kerala Finally Uploaded
In non-free format and proprietary YouTube, but perhaps that's better than nothing
Islands Are Leaving Microsoft Behind, According to statCounter
Android has had a very strong year
EPO Management Fails to Deny That the Office is Discriminating Against Women
Europe's second-largest institution isn't just exceedingly corrupt but also immoral
In Some Countries the Market Share of Vista 11 is Going Down, Not Up
despite being released in 2021
Rumour: Mass Layoffs in IBM Canada Today
Maybe later today some people from Canada will say something firmer and maybe some media will even talk about that
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 26, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, March 26, 2025
Gemini Links 27/03/2025: X-Files' "Kill Switch", Orlando, and ASN (Autonomous System Number) 'Hack'
Links for the day