Bonum Certa Men Certa

The Eastern District of Texas and Its Patent Trolls Affinity Not a Solved Issue

A computer chained



Summary: The American patent system continues to distribute monopolies on algorithms and some of these cause litigation to reach courts that are notorious for intolerance of 35 U.S.C. €§ 101, resulting in unnecessary payments to lawyers and patent trolls

IN THE WAKE of TC Heartland (last summer) it was hoped that the courts in the Eastern District of Texas would see little or no more patent lawsuit filings. The effect of TC Heartland was profound, but it didn't go far enough. When will judges follow the law down there? There are signs that they begrudgingly and only belatedly do so.

Meanwhile, there are new Dallas (the east of Texas) patents granted by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Some of these seem to have been wrongly granted based on 35 U.S.C. €§ 101. Those will possibly lead to frivolous lawsuits or at least shakedowns.

The patent maximalist Matthew Bultman says that the Federal Circuit insists Apple should be on trial in a court that advertises being lax to plaintiffs like patent trolls with abstract patents. Never mind if Apple isn't based in Texas. In Bultman's words (that aren't behind paywall):

The Federal Circuit on Tuesday allowed a lawsuit against Apple Inc. over patents covering a communication system to move forward in the Eastern District of Texas...


Based on the above, it's likely a software patent and the action may have been initiated by a troll (hard to tell because of the paywall).

Speaking of trolls, they nowadays issue press releases in prominent sites; they try to warp the narrative. The spammy Associated Press (press releases as a section) writes nonsense for a patent troll Avanci (we wrote about it before) or rather publishes lies for it, as did other sites. Lies like these: "The Avanci platform simplifies the way companies share technology by licensing intellectual property from many different patent holders in a single transaction. Avanci’s licenses are offered to all competitors in an industry at the same fair, flat rates that will not increase over the term of the license no matter how many patent owners join the platform."

Avanci is a patent troll that pretends to be "licensing"; we already wrote about its origins. Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) inter partes reviews (IPRs) would likely not shield against this troll because the number of patents at hand is too large to handle exhaustively by IPRs.

To properly tackle the issue we probably ought to push harder for all examiners -- like most courts and judges -- to respect and uphold 35 U.S.C. €§ 101. A lot of software patents are still being granted and some form the basis of lawsuits, as we shall explain in later posts (later tonight).

Recent Techrights' Posts

Slopwatch: The March of Slopfarms, From UbuntuPIT to Linux Journal and to Various Fake Sites Still Promoted by Google News
It's so worrying to see what the Web has become
Links 29/10/2025: CISA, Ukraine, and Amazon Problems
Links for the day
[Teaser] The EPO's Spokesperson, a Cocaine User, Fancies Young Women
How's that for "optics" in the EU and Europe's second-largest institution?
How Will António Campinos Respond to the EPO's 'Cocainegate'?
That's the same thing we saw and still see when the press deals with enablers and partners of Jeffrey Epstein
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part IV: There Cannot be Free Software Without Free Press and Free Information
One day, one can hope, more people will recognise that for Software Freedom we need free press and free thinkers
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part III: Principled Stance Is Never Cheap
Protecting the truth and insisting that the general public is made aware of things that really happened isn't cheap
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part II: Because Scarcity of Accurate Information Breeds Collective Ignorance
we too will strive to share information that's aggressively suppressed
Gemini Links 28/10/2025: More New Arrivals at Geminispace, xkcd on "Document Forgery"
Links for the day
Join Us Now and Share the News - Part I: Defence of the Truth
This year we make a very strong, firm statement for truth, even if that means explaining our work to the top media judge in the country
Links 28/10/2025: Meta and Fentanylware (CheeTok) Age-Restricted Down Under, "Britain Needs China’s Money"
Links for the day
Links 28/10/2025: Mass Layoffs at Amazon and Charter to Cut 1,200 Jobs
Links for the day
The Cocaine Patent Office - Part II: The Person Who Planted Paid-for Fake News for the European Patent Office (EPO) is a Cocaine User, Friend of António Campinos, Now on Record as Having Been Arrested
Background: High-level manager at the European Patent Office caught in public with cocaine, arrested
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 27, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, October 27, 2025
Google News Drowning in Slop (and Slopfarms That Hijack About Half the Results)
Google News seems to be drowning in this stuff
Gemini Links 28/10/2025: "How to Maximize Your Positive Impact" and ASCII Art and Artist Attribution
Links for the day
PETA and Activism
Being staff or volunteer in PETA isn't easy
Big Blue, Huge Debt
debt will soar again
Links 27/10/2025: Mass Surveillance Sold as "AI", People Reluctant to Lose Physical Media
Links for the day
Parties and Milestones Again
we've begun putting up about 40 balloons
Techrights' 19th Anniversary: Bronze
Time to go back to preparing for this anniversary
Our Latest European Patent Office (EPO) Series Will Last Several Weeks, Will Ask the EPO Management and the European Union (EU) Very Difficult Questions
If nobody loses a job (or jobs) over this, then the EU basically became no better than Colombia or Nicaragua
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, UbuntuPIT, Brian Fagioli, and Google News
We focus on stories that are fake or LLM slop that disguises itself as "news" about Linux
Links 27/10/2025: Wikipedia Vandalism, Bruce Perens Opens up on Childhood
Links for the day
This Site Could Not be Done by LLMs Even If It Wanted to (Because It's Not a Parrot of What Other Sites Say)
LLMs have no knowledge or deep understanding
Microsoft is Disloyal Towards Its Most Loyal Employees
Against its most faithful enablers
19 Years, No Censorship
No factual information is ever going to be removed, more so if it is in the public interest
We Are Not a Conventional Site, That's Why They Hate (or Love) Us
Throughout the week this week we'll be focusing on the EPO
Following the Line of Cocaine All the Way to the Top
Even a million denials and spin-doctoring won't distract from the core issue
The Cocaine Patent Office - Part I: António Campinos Brought Corruption and Nepotism to the EPO, Then Came the Cocaine
High-level manager at the European Patent Office (EPO) caught in public with cocaine, the Office has some answering to do
Purchasing/Possessing Computers Isn't the Same as Controlling Computers
Let's strive to put computers back under the control of their users, no matter who purchased these (usually the users)
Gemini Links 27/10/2025: Alhena 5.4.3 and Fixing Bash
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, October 26, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, October 26, 2025
Thankfully We've Made Copies of More Interesting Data From statCounter
If statCounter (the Web site or the 'webapp') vanished overnight, we'd still have something left of it
More Silent Layoffs at IBM/Red Hat
when the media counts such layoffs or presents tallies the numbers are very incomplete