Patent reform opponents have been arguing that companies make a deliberate calculation and decide to infringe patents. Not only is this not true, but the argument is a subtle way of pushing for what opponents of reform really want.
There should be a rule of thumb for patent trolls: don’t target the disabled. You ignore this rule at your peril. Notorious patent troll MPHJ did, and now it’s just been sued by the Vermont Attorney General for violating the Vermont Consumer Protection Act. MPHJ, and its 40 or so shell companies, goes around threatening…
EFF recently wrote about a startup called DITTO that sells eyewear online using a technology it developed to let people see how the glasses would look on them using a webcam. DITTO is being sued by 1-800-CONTACTS for patent infringement. It has also been sued by a PAE in the Eastern District of Texas. To…
As Josh Lamel noted the other day, end-users such as retailers, financial services, grocery stores, advertising, hotel industries, and even oil companies are coming out in droves to fight abusive patent troll tactics. The FTC has posted all 68 public comments submitted to its patent assertion entity workshop; a surprising number come from end-users. Patent…
It’s the tech startup dream: coming up with a great idea, raising funding to make it a reality, gaining users, hiring a first, second, and third employee. Hiring just as many lawyers. When a startup has more attorneys than staff, something is wrong. But one startup founder, who chooses to remain anonymous, just hired his…
Over the last several months, we have been vocal in our calls for software patent reform to put an end to the threat of lawsuits on behalf of patent assertion entities (PAEs), more commonly known as patent trolls. Why? Because at Rackspace it has become our most pressing legal issue. Since 2010, our spending to…
CCIA is hosting an important event on Thursday, February 28th entitled “How Patent Trolls are Harming Innovation.” The event will take place in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, and will feature six prominent panelist offering different but harmonious opinions on the current state of the patent troll environment: Julie Samuels, Mark Cuban Chair to Eliminate Stupid…
Today, more than 60 entrepreneurs wrote to Congress demanding Congress do something about the growing threat patent assertion entities are creating for the startup community. Led by Engine Advocacy and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, these entrepreneurs are joining CCIA in supporting the reintroduction of the SHIELD Act by Representatives DeFazio and Chaffetz today. The text…
As Patent Progress reported in this post, Friday afternoon President Obama came out strong against patent trolls, saying, They’re just trying to essentially leverage and hijack somebody else’s idea and see if they can extort some money out of them. Unfortunately, some patent troll defenders responded with a personal attack on the President as doing…
Market participants, regulators, lawyers, and patent professionals gathered at the FTC yesterday for a very informative Workshop on Patent Assertion Entities (PAEs). We will be posting more this week about specific takeaways and action items for enacting true reform in this space, but I wanted to share some themes and reactions from the event: More…
