03.30.16
Gemini version available ♊︎IAM ‘Magazine’ Cannot Say ‘Patent Trolls’
Maybe the funding from patent trolls has something to do with it…
Summary: Whatever IAM says, it’ll never use the “T” word (trolls) or even acknowledge the existence of them
MR. Wild, editor in chief of IAM ‘magazine’ (basically a Web site), insists that the term patent troll is meaningless, even when given a definition of it from Wikipedia. We can almost empathise because it’s not easy for Wild, whose salary is partly composed of patent trolls’ payments, to acknowledge the problem.
“IAM hides the reality of it pretty well.”According to Wikipedia, Openwave “has changed its name to Unwired Planet” (for what we wrote about Openwave see these search results). It’s essentially a kind of patent troll. This new article from Wild neglects to say that Unwired Planet is basically a patent troll armed by Ericsson in order to do the ‘enforcement’ (extortion) without risking (counter) litigation. It’s the same kind of trick Microsoft uses against the competition, notably GNU/Linux/Android. What we find rather amazing/stunning/remarkable is that while reading IAM in general (as I have done for a few months, almost exhaustively) one can come across a lot of patent trolls and see them all groomed so well — to the point where they seem like legitimate companies. IAM hides the reality of it pretty well.
There are good reasons to boycott Rovi, for example, especially now that it’s going after the competition using software patents and also works with the world’s biggest patent troll (Microsoft’s troll), but one wouldn’t know this based on IAM ‘magazine’. They wouldn’t even call Intellectual Ventures a troll.
“They wouldn’t even call Intellectual Ventures a troll.”On patent trolls in China, to give another new example, IAM says almost nothing with the “T” word; it calls them NPEs to improve their image. Right here one learns about the “threat to Taiwanese companies by US NPEs” (they mean patent trolls). Where is the “T” word? What the author means to say is US patent trolls in Taiwan, including “Microsoft Licensing” (e.g. versus Acer's Linux, based in Taiwan), but with media like this, what are readers going to deduce? To quote a whole paragraph: “Of course, policymakers may simply have concluded that a wait-and-see approach makes more sense than a massive investment in patent aggregation at a time of uncertainty in the patent system – after all, the threat to Taiwanese companies by US NPEs has recently diminished somewhat. If the island does make another effort at setting up an SPF, it may even be advantaged by its late start. As far as I can see, the existing SPFs have largely focused their efforts on acquiring US patents up to this point. Would a fund starting out today pursue the same strategy, given the potential that we might keep seeing more NPE litigation in Europe and less in the US? There are certainly interesting models to study in neighbouring countries, and their public record of successes and stumbles will continue to grow this year.”
“Money on the table always contributes towards corrupting the media, which is why we, for example, issue no call for donations.”What we are trying to show here is that IAM, having accepted money from all sorts of patent trolls, is not telling readers the full story. Money on the table always contributes towards corrupting the media, which is why we, for example, issue no call for donations.
Mr. Wild is trying hard to discredit me in Twitter (using his personal account, not IAM’s), but maybe he should introspect instead and come to grips with what really drives the agenda over at IAM. He oughtn’t just blame the messenger who points this out. █
“Maybe this world is another planet`s hell.”
–Aldous Huxley
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