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Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

blog.newegg.com

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Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#51

Post by tachion »

adebtlawyer wrote: post #45
tachion wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are other countries, where this issue is solved (more or less) by the fact that the side which have lost the case is covering trial costs. This does stop 'court trolling' because even is the cost of winning the case is higher than the cost of the settlement, winning the case nullifies that cost. But hey, US is special this way! (and many others... ;)

Having litigated against adversaries who use the courts primarily to be a nuisance, with little or no regard to the actual strength or weakness of their claims, I've become convinced "loser pays costs and attorney's fees of prevailing party" is a better system than what we have in the U.S.

This is not the only difference between the justice systems in US and EU (EU is what I consider to be elswhere): in US the case is the battle between boths sides lawyer, and the judge is simply a watching function, that a the end calls the sentence, based on the outcome of that battle. In EU, the case is a so called 'process of finding material truth' and the judge can take active stance, call witnesses, ask additional questions, call for professional opinions and so on - it is no longer a battle of who has better lawyers but a way to find what's the actual state of things.

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#52

Post by ikeboy »

stonemetal wrote: post #46
ikeboy wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you know you have a valid case (you aren't a troll), how hard would it be in practice to find someone to front the money for a lawsuit? Or for that matter, could you go to the competition and sell your patent? That is, say Apple's infringing on my patent; will Samsung buy the patent from me for a fair price and then sue Apple?

to find someone to front the money for a lawsuit? That is one of the problems, he who fronts the money expects to get the reward. Hence class actions where the lawyer who works on contingency gets millions and those wronged get a nickle.

Of course, but

1. You'll still get a significant sum if the total is significant (and if the case is open-and-shut, the risk wouldn't be too high for an investor, so you could get a favorable deal)

2. The infringing company would have to pay in full, which discourages them from doing it in the first place.

I guess I really want to know is if this actually happens in practice, or if there are reasons I'm not thinking of that stop it from happening.

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#53

Post by bargl »

kazinator wrote: post #42

You don't really win until the legal atmosphere is such that the the key personalities behind a patent troll operation get 10 years in jail.

You mean you don't win the war? I'd say this is definitely a battle that they won, but there is still a ton of work to do to change the legal atmosphere in the USA.

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#56

Post by rollback »

startupfounder wrote: post #48
ikeboy wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you know you have a valid case (you aren't a troll), how hard would it be in practice to find someone to front the money for a lawsuit? Or for that matter, could you go to the competition and sell your patent? That is, say Apple's infringing on my patent; will Samsung buy the patent from me for a fair price and then sue Apple?

> how hard would it be in practice to find someone to front the money for a lawsuit? What about paying into an troll insurance policy every month so that if a troll wanted to sue you they would see that you were protected and would fight the lawsuit with a giant pile of money. This might deter the troll from suing in the first place.

There is a whole ecosystem that is funding these lawsuits. It also operates somewhat anonymously, with funding sources working directly with law firms and indirectly with inventors (if they are even involved anymore). I've seen emails between law firms and the inventor that literally title the investors as "the funding source." The original inventor need not put any money at risk, and the law firms and funding sources do their own diligence to decide if it's worth proceeding to file suits. In most cases, the entity filing suit is created for each series of attacks so that if they actually lose a suit and are supposed to pay out, there are no assets from which to pay. Therefore, low risk and potentially very high reward.

The biggest factor for that is not the validity of the patents, but the breadth and ability of the patents to be filed against "juicy" targets with a lot of cash. The cost of filing a suit is literally in the hundreds of dollars (I think ~$750) and most of these cases get settled out fairly early because of the immense cost of the defendants to complete the discovery process.

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#57

Post by brlewis »

throwawaykf05 wrote: post #25
mcherm wrote: post #14

I really appreciate Newegg's approach here -- one of the main reasons that patent trolling is so successful is that the cost of settling is smaller even than the cost of winning a suit. Newegg is performing an (expensive) community service. How should I be supporting them (other than making them my "first place to check" for electronics shopping)?

> one of the main reasons that patent trolling is so successful is that the cost of settling is smaller even than the cost of winning a suit. Is the underlying reason for this strategy the low costs of settlement, or the extremely high costs of lawsuits? What if the value of a patent really is only a few thousand dollars? Note that this very tactic is used by big companies to avoid licensing valid and useful patents…

I'm a software engineer. Consequently I have to admit ignorance about this concept of a valid and useful patent. All I ever see is patents that hinder the Progress of Science and useful Arts. Are there really enough valid and useful patents that we should hesitate in our fight against the rest?

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#58

Post by nandhp »

vermontdevil wrote: post #31
masklinn wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is this happening in the first place? Because US patent laws and practices allow for it > Who is this entity that grants a loose patent? The United States Patents and Trademark Office. > Why isn't this entity being interrogated ? Because there would be very little point. One part of the issue is patent laws themselves, the other part is that the USPTO is taken to task for both overly lengthy examinations[0] and…

Good points. Don't forget the Court in Eastern Texas which is a popular place for patent lawsuits. Popular because the court is friendly to patent trolls due to the revenue the court generates. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_District_Court_f...

And the frequent charitable donations Samsung makes to causes in Marshall, TX, home of many of the the court's jurors.

https://ipcloseup.wordpress.com/2015/02/25/for-samsung-chari...

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#59

Post by shmerl »

emirozer wrote: post #3

Please excuse my ignorance on this topic. - Why is this happening in the first place? - Who is this entity that grants a loose patent? - Why isn't this entity being interrogated ?

Because laws are broken and allow brazen protection racket to be declared "legal". In any normal society such racketeers should be in jail. And the reason laws are broken is basically corruption. See how patent reform constantly stalls because those who profit from this sabotage it all the time.

Re: Newegg vs. Patent Trolls: When We Win, You Win

#60

Post by jebblue »

brlewis wrote: post #57
throwawaykf05 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> one of the main reasons that patent trolling is so successful is that the cost of settling is smaller even than the cost of winning a suit. Is the underlying reason for this strategy the low costs of settlement, or the extremely high costs of lawsuits? What if the value of a patent really is only a few thousand dollars? Note that this very tactic is used by big companies to avoid licensing valid and useful patents…

I'm a software engineer. Consequently I have to admit ignorance about this concept of a valid and useful patent. All I ever see is patents that hinder the Progress of Science and useful Arts. Are there really enough valid and useful patents that we should hesitate in our fight against the rest?

I'm confused, are you asking if you should be fighting patent trolls or patents? If trolls, then fighting them is better than not. Patents are tools, valid and legal, you don't fight tools, you use them, improve them, complain about them, etc.
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