Inability or unwillingness to actually understand/grasp the term? Inversion of roles/narratives is a lie, not "alternative facts".
Summary: A software patents advocacy site, which generally dislikes technology companies, deliberately misuses the term "troll" and still attempts to abolish quality control, such as PTAB and ۤ 101
IT is no secret that Watchtroll likes patent trolls more than it likes actual technology companies. It constantly makes that evident. One might say that the site actively berates and thus hates technology companies and it even demonises those who support technology rather than litigation. It actually does matter because many patent zealots get suckered by this cult (the Cult of Patents) and it threatens science and technology in the same way EPO management does.
As readers of ours may recall, software patents were leveraged by BlackBerry when it sued several companies with them. BlackBerry started it and it is BlackBerry acting like patent trolls, according to some patent maximalists too. BlackBerry is a failing company (see its performance over the year), so now it resorts to almost nothing but litigation. Facebook's response to BlackBerry's ridiculous lawsuit was widely covered by mainstream media for well over a week, with examples ranging from English to French, German, Mandarin and so on. There were articles aplenty and there are still newer ones like this one. We can't give an exhausive list because it's virtually everywhere. Earlier today, however, Watchtroll came up with the most ridiculous framing. "Facebook patent infringement suit against BlackBerry looks remarkably patent troll-like," Watchtroll said today (right there in its headline). Wait, what?!
"...we assume it's one among many similar stunts that attempt to misuse/overuse the term "trolls" to make it seem out of place and inappropriate in general."Surely the founder of Watchtroll knows what started all this. But we assume it's one among many similar stunts that attempt to misuse/overuse the term "trolls" to make it seem out of place and inappropriate in general. Perhaps we could just ignore this and move on, but this has become part of a trend. These people pretend that the term "patent troll" is meaningless by calling "trolls" people who certainly are not. They paint with a very broad brush, deliberately so.
Other ridiculous new articles from Watchtroll include this new smear of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). New 'scandals' from a few hours ago? No. It attempts to make a scandal out of an inter partes review (IPR) that is pretty ordinary. Separately, and dated yesterday, there's another one of these attacks on Section 101 from Burman York (Bud) Mathis III, i.e. the patent microcosm. "There Are Two Types of €§ 101 Rejections" and "Congress, Not the Supreme Court, Determines the Scope of Patent Eligibility," he says. Actually, no. SCOTUS determines, based on the Constitution etc., what the law says. Congress just does what a bunch of lobbyists ask, e.g. those that now lobby to abolish PTAB. It's not hard to see why the patent microcosm wants politicians to simply override SCOTUS, overturn (sort of) SCOTUS decisions, and undo AIA. But such is the nature of sites like Watchtroll. We ignore while we can and rebut when it seems necessary. ⬆