back to article US Supreme Court to hear case that may ruin Lone Star patent trolls

The legal case of TC Heartland v Kraft Foods may appear to have very little to do with technology, but it could make life a lot harder for patent trolls – thanks to a US Supreme Court decision on Thursday. The case between the two was brought by Kraft over its Mio Water Enhancer, a mixture of salt and flavorings for those who …

  1. Paul Slater

    If the state patent laws were harmonised then it wouldn't matter at all where they were heard (in theory).

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    2. kain preacher

      No such thing as state patent laws. It's all on the federal level. Now what happens is these judge are never spanked for their rulings. What needs to happen is clear cut rules need to be handed down to them.

      1. Eddy Ito

        The judges in east Texas aren't spanked because it's almost always a jury trial. The judge just scowls and bangs his little hammer to shut people up.

        1. Charles 9

          But Courts of Appeal are never ruled by juries but by panels of judges: in this case, usually a panel of three but sometimes the entire court. Thing is, this particular district is, as noted, very patent-friendly. The reasons judges don't get spanked is because they're supposed to be insulated from that kind of discipline. Once confirmed, they serve until death or voluntary retirement. The only exception to that case is to be impeached in the House and then convicted in the Senate (which requires a 2/3 majority).

          1. imanidiot Silver badge

            @Charles 9

            Unless they work in one of the states that have retention elections or even competitive elections. Then they CAN get fired or voted out.

            1. Charles 9

              I believe the judges in question are federal. ALL Federal judges, per the Constitution, Article III, MUST be nominated, then confirmed.

            2. a_yank_lurker

              @imanidiot - All federal judges serve for life once confirmed unless impeached and convicted or they retire. This per the US Constitution.

          2. The IT Ghost

            Actually, if the judge is accused of malpractice in some manner the the Bar Association takes exception to, and they elected to pull the judge's license to practice law, that judge can be removed from the bench without Congressional action. But getting a group of lawyers to narc on another lawyer is probably harder than getting a formal impeachment. To the best of my knowledge, being licensed to practice law is required to be a Federal judge - ergo, if you are no longer licensed, you are no longer qualified to serve. But, it wouldn't surprise me a bit if there wasn't a clause hidden somewhere that negates what seems a common sense rule. If a person drives a truck, and loses his driver's license, he gets fired from the job. So if getting the job requires a law license, and you lose it, you SHOULD lose the job. But...lawyers.

            1. Charles 9

              "Actually, if the judge is accused of malpractice in some manner the the Bar Association takes exception to, and they elected to pull the judge's license to practice law, that judge can be removed from the bench without Congressional action."

              I believe licenses are a state thing, and since these judges are federal, different rules apply, thus the confirmation process. A confirmed judge basically has been granted the authority to adjudicate on the federal level since IIRC there is no federal licensing process. Ask yourself: from which state must a judge obtain a license in order to be able to be a federal judge. Besides, since when can the ABA overrule Congress? IOW, the only legal body with the authority to "pull" a judge's "license" to practice federal law is Congress: via the impeachment process.

    3. a_yank_lurker

      @Paul Slater - US states have no jurisdiction in patent cases. This is purely a federal matter. The normal practice is to sue in the defendant's federal district court (for a company, where they incorporated/headquarters) not a any venue in the country. This has been ignored by the courts for too long. The Nine Seniles might accidently get this right.

    4. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Devil

      patent laws federal; districts and judges to blame

      "If the state patent laws were harmonised"

      nice try, because I see why you'd say this. But the patent laws are federal laws, and therefore could be heard in ANY state, in a federal court, before a federal judge.

      The problem is that l[aw]yers will OFTEN try to get judges and/or districts that give them a better chance to win. You know, like playing football [American or UK] on a field of your OWN choosing.

      That eastern Texas district [recently portrayed on an episode of 'Bull'], and apparently Deleware, are reportedly "friendly" to patent trolls. So guess where THEIR high-paid l[aw]yers want the trials to be? No surprise.

      If the *people* were consistent, both judges AND jury pool, then we wouldn't have this problem. So your original statement was correct, except for the details.

      Hopefully a more CONSERVATIVE supreme court [expected when Trump starts appointing Scalia's replacement] will NOT side with patent trolls, but INSTEAD, with the EARLIER ruling (i.e. in a court that's local to the plaintiff/petitioner or the defendant/respondent). I would say that, in the spirit of criminal proceedings, that the respondent/defendant would be able to have some priority in choosing a venue, out of fairness. It should ALWAYS be harder to prosecute than to defend, after all, and any kind of "tort reform" demands favor to the accused.

      [And, with all of the times Trump has been frivolously sued, you'd think he might be moderately interested in dealing with this PROPERLY - having deep pockets makes you a TARGET for the TROLLS]

      1. Charles 9

        Re: patent laws federal; districts and judges to blame

        Only one thing. Some of the trolls have deep pockets, too, and don't so much troll as bully you.

  2. leon clarke

    So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

    ...assuming I'm following.

    The interesting thing is that very many companies are incorporated in Delaware as that's the most tax-efficient thing to do. So it'll make matters better than East Texas. But not much better.

    Until some state decides to have uniquely sensible patent policies (My proposed sensible patent policy:'NO') and everyone incorporates there, knowing that the tax is cheaper than paying the patent trolls.

    1. Dr. Mouse

      Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

      My proposed sensible patent policy:'NO'

      Forgive me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be suggesting that noone should get patents at all. Basically people should have no way to protect their intellectual property.

      So, I'm an engineer. If I was to spend years designing and developing, say, a radically new car engine design, it is acceptable for another company to come along and copy my design? I should not be allowed to make a penny from my own design, which I have spent years on?

      I would have to disagree with you on that. While I believe patent law, especially in the USA, needs reform, it certainly should NOT be abandoned.

      1. Charles 9

        Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

        "So, I'm an engineer. If I was to spend years designing and developing, say, a radically new car engine design, it is acceptable for another company to come along and copy my design? I should not be allowed to make a penny from my own design, which I have spent years on?

        I would have to disagree with you on that. While I believe patent law, especially in the USA, needs reform, it certainly should NOT be abandoned."

        For really, REALLY big companies, patents are just ink on a page. They can simply bully you nonstop until either your patent expires, you cave, or they engineer a way to get around your patent.

        1. Alan Brown Silver badge

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

          "For really, REALLY big companies, patents are just ink on a page."

          So is copyright

          "They can simply bully you nonstop until either your patent expires, you cave, or they engineer a way to get around your patent."

          Or steal your work and dare you to sue them. It worked for Microsoft.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

          What you described is NOT a patent troll. To whit:

          " they engineer a way to get around your patent."

          Patent trolls don't make products, then don't engineer shit, they only have lawyers. If something or someone is "out engineering you" then you do it back, or ship your crap as is, or shut up, or shut down. That is how the market works, in general. You need to come to grips with the real issues of patent trolls and what it means. You are a bit confused, friend.

        3. TVU Silver badge

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

          "So, I'm an engineer. If I was to spend years designing and developing, say, a radically new car engine design, it is acceptable for another company to come along and copy my design? I should not be allowed to make a penny from my own design, which I have spent years on?

          I would have to disagree with you on that. While I believe patent law, especially in the USA, needs reform, it certainly should NOT be abandoned."

          ^ I fully agree with the above and that's what patent law should be about - ensuring due rights, income and reward for creators for their new and original ideas, processes and products.

          However, I take great exception to legal shell companies being formed to buy up patent rights solely for the purpose of suing others to gain an income. I regard that as abuse and the worst kind of commercial parasitism and I'd love to see a precedent case set which would effectively bar this type of leeching practice.

      2. Number6

        Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

        The problem with the patent system in the US at the moment is that it no longer rewards innovation, it rewards those with the deepest pockets. The USPTO appears to have forgotten that patents are supposed to be novel - too often it's a small and obvious incremental improvement. The fact that they seem inclined (and even incentivised) to grant patents and let the courts sort it out is a big part of this problem. USPTO should be doing plenty of groundwork and challenging applicants to minimise the subsequent litigation.

        I remember once being presented with a problem, proposed the obvious solution to that problem immediately, only to find that some large corporation had patented it. If it's obvious to those skilled in the art then it shouldn't be patentable unless it can be shown that the thought process needed to get to that point is novel.

        1. Charles 9

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

          "The fact that they seem inclined (and even incentivised) to grant patents and let the courts sort it out is a big part of this problem."

          That's due to the USPTO's biggest problem: shoestring budgets.

          1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

            "That's due to the USPTO's biggest problem: shoestring budgets."

            And also their biggest advantage - they don't get to pick up the bills for fixing their mistakes.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

              "And also their biggest advantage - they don't get to pick up the bills for fixing their mistakes."

              Not so much that as, "We ain't got the money to fix these. So you either fix these or the USPTO has to shut up shop." And a country without patents can get pretty ugly as we go back to the dark world of trade secrets and industrial espionage.

        2. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

          Re: Number6

          Patents must be obvious. The easiest way to avoid prior art is to include something so obvious that it would never be explained in a technical journal. Journals do not publish articles on topics so elementary that anyone with the faintest interest in the subject would already know because that would be a boring waste of advert space. Patent examiners recognise this trick at once and approve the patent immediately because the rules define non-obvious as "not published in a journal". Also, if your patent really is non-obvious then there is no-one infringing it for you to sue.

        3. Eric Olson

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

          The USPTO appears to have forgotten that patents are supposed to be novel - too often it's a small and obvious incremental improvement.

          Actually, novel inventions are quite rare. Even the the first patents issued were improvements upon existing processes. The original Patent Act of 1790 explicitly names "improvement thereon not before known or used". That Act was scrapped in three years because it was found to be too hard to obtain a patent. The new Act went out of its way to remove any notion that the invention or improvement had to be important, just that it was not known to the people granting patents.

          The obviousness test wasn't introduced until 1952... many years and hundreds of thousands of patents later. And even then, what does obvious mean? If you are in front of a jury, a small tweak to a manufacturing process might seem novel, but to a process engineer it might have been so sensible that it could be found in dozens or hundreds of other products. How do you evaluate that? (answer: you're screwed now that the US has moved to first-to-file, though maybe you can find some evidence that it was known in the field well before the patent was submitted and get it invalidated)

          TL;DR: Stop fetishizing the patent as if it was some holy writ handed down from on high using stone tablets; it's law made by humans that has undergone significant revisions. A patent allows knowledge that would otherwise be locked away a chance to see the light and be used, while enriching the creator or company that has the patent.

      3. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

        Re: Why we need the patent system

        Let's pretend you are an engineer and you have a new car engine design.

        Clearly the first thing to do is get a job to live on while you spend years getting your patent through the system. Finally, your patent is approved, are you shop around for a manufacturer. You get sent packing by all of them, but Faultswagon starts selling an engine copied from your design. Off you go East Texas, and your patent lawyers ask for money. You sell your house, then the wife and children but it is still not enough to feed the lawyers. You are then offered a deal from General Monsters: They will take charge of the law suit, pay for it and you will get 10% royalties. After you sign in blood Faultswagon and General Monsters agree a cross licensing deal. No money changes hands and you get 10% of nothing.

        Last decade, properly defending a patent cost at least $10M. If you want to win that way, do not bother doing any R&D. Just patent jibberish and send out infringement complaints to random small businesses. Some will settle, and use that cash to annoy bigger and bigger fish until you can afford sue Microsoft. Microsoft will 'settle' on the condition that you use the money to sue Google.

        1. Orv Silver badge

          Re: Why we need the patent system

          In practice the alternative to patents is trade secrets; in the absence of those legal protections companies simply don't share their innovations, except to the extent that someone can reverse engineer them.

          This isn't ideal for society either; technologies become "lost" when their parent companies die, for example.

          I think the patent system needs reform but I think the original idea of publishing your IP in exchange for a short term monopoly is a good compromise.

          1. Alan Brown Silver badge

            Re: Why we need the patent system

            "technologies become "lost" when their parent companies die, for example."

            Or when there's no longer a demand for XYZ product and the people with the knowledge retire.

            Amongst other things almost lost due to this: the ability to make seamless tubing.

            NASA resorted to hacking the gun barrels off of Liberty Ships to get what it needed to build Space Shuttle Main Engines whilst simultaneously trawling resthomes to find retired metallurgists and pump their brains on lost lore before they expired.

            1. Truckle The Uncivil

              Re: Why we need the patent system

              Could you post a reference the the gun barrels thing please. I have been unable to find one.

              1. Francis Boyle Silver badge

                Seconded

                I also went looking. Learnt a lot about liberty ships but nothing about why their gun barrel might be so special. (Also discovered that NASA has a secret space navy but I'm calling citation needed on that one.)

            2. Truckle The Uncivil

              Re: Why we need the patent system

              Re: Liberty Ship Gun Barrels.

              You appear to have made this statement before. Some searched. None reported having found evidence. You were asked to supply it. You did not.

              Support your claim (people are curious) or please refrain from making it.

      4. Daggerchild Silver badge

        Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

        So, I'm an engineer. If I was to spend years designing and developing, say, a radically new car engine design, it is acceptable for another company to come along and copy my design? I should not be allowed to make a penny from my own design, which I have spent years on?

        But the problem is: So, I'm an engineer too, and I spent a month on a car engine design, and then find out we both had the same idea and have reached the same result via different routes.

        Who should be rewarded, and who should be punished? You definitely put a lot of resources into designing it, while I didn't.

        Real World example: in Uni I needed to whip up an algorithm to sort a particular niche problem. So I did. I later found that algorithm in a book, and it was named the Foo-Bar-Baz algorithm (names may not be exact) after the three people who designed it, many, many years ago.

        How is anyone, anywhere, able to invent anything anymore? Why would you even try? Surely you'll just see your children ripped from your hands by people older and fatter than you.

      5. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Pirate

        Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

        "While I believe patent law, especially in the USA, needs reform, it certainly should NOT be abandoned."

        ACK.

        But it seems to me that SOME patents should never be granted, and in general they should be DIFFICULT to enforce. In other words, if the new thingy is 'different enough', and only has elements from YOUR patent that are either a) intuitively obvious, or b) trivial, or c) unnecessary to the scope of the patent, or d) done by others for similar or even unrelated reasons, then there should be NO violation.

        Adding flavor or salt to water shouldn't be a violation of a patent, since this has been done since koolaid was invented. That was more than 50 years ago, by my observation.

        Also if you invent something before someone else patents it, the patent should be DENIED on that basis [as long as you can prove it]. NOT filing shouldn't be a punishment. A good example (as I understand it) would be something that happened to Harley Davidson back in the early days. They were sued over a clutch design that they never patented. So someone else patented it (Indian motorcycles?), then sued them for infringement, nearly wrecking the company. At least, that's how it's portrayed on TV.

        In my opinion, THAT should NEVER happen. Evidence of 'prior art' should *ALWAYS* invalidate ANY patent claim. Indian motorcycles TROLLED them.

        But who knows WHAT would happen in a Texas or Deleware federal court...

        1. Eric Olson

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation @bombastic bob

          A good example (as I understand it) would be something that happened to Harley Davidson back in the early days. They were sued over a clutch design that they never patented. So someone else patented it (Indian motorcycles?), then sued them for infringement, nearly wrecking the company.

          That doesn't really make sense, given that until 2013, the US was a first-to-invent regime (one of the last, if not the last). That means that if you had evidence that you had invented the same thing earlier, you could have the patent invalidate (or maybe transferred to you?). Even today, the majority of patents that are still active were filed under the first-to-invent model. The change only impacted patents filed 2013 or later.

          The point of a patent is twofold: add knowledge to the public body and allow the inventor a chance to profit or recoup investment for a period of time. As pointed out above, knowledge dies when it's kept hidden for fear of being copied and put out of business. Trade secrets or "special sauce" thinking has kept a lot of discoveries behind closed doors. Many may be similar to other secrets, or the same secret repeated dozens of times. If that is the case, a lot of time, money, and materials were wasted to reinvent the wheel over and over. That also means those brains could have spent the time modifying something else, or even creating a novel way of doing something.

          A first-to-file (plus the reduced fees for small and micro inventors) incentivizes people to file for a patent rather than sit on it as insurance or try to hide it while fruitlessly shopping it around. Plus it defuses a number of potential landmines, where you do your homework, find no patent for something, file it, then have ConstructoSoft sue you to invalidate your patent based on "prior art" they found in a dusty technical drawing that was only used once, but might show a similar design.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation @bombastic bob

            "That doesn't really make sense, given that until 2013, the US was a first-to-invent regime (one of the last, if not the last)."

            I once heard a story that Alexander Graham Bell almost didn't get the patent for the telephone due to another inventor submitting an application for an identitcal-but-independently-developed design the same day, only a few hours later. Can this story be clarified with some authority? And no, due to the potential for apocrypha, I'm not inclined to try to look up the story on Google.

    2. a_yank_lurker

      Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

      Patents are a federal matter not a state matter. All of these cases are in FEDERAL court. Patents and copyrights are specifically mentioned in the Constitution with Congress being able to enact legislation granting patents and copyrights for the "promotion of arts and sciences".

      1. Alan Brown Silver badge

        Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

        > Patents and copyrights are specifically mentioned in the Constitution with Congress being able to enact legislation granting patents and copyrights for the "promotion of arts and sciences".

        It's worth noting that the original period of copyright and patents were actually reasonable ones.

        1. Eric Olson

          Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

          It's worth noting that the original period of copyright and patents were actually reasonable ones.

          Patents are limited to 20 years; the original Patent Act limited them to 14 years.

          You have a point with copyright, though that was still up to 28 years from the start, and Europe went to lifetime of the creator + 50 years in the mid-1800s. Right now, it's creator's life + 70 years, if we are talking only about single creators.

          1. Charles 9

            Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

            "Patents are limited to 20 years; the original Patent Act limited them to 14 years."

            For machinery patents (machines tend to be used for decades) and medical patents (which take almost that long just to pass the testing to see they're safe), that's OK. But software and other nonphysical patents live in a world running at breakneck speed, and this length is now inappropriate. While some would say you shouldn't patent ideas, the flip side is that people won't divulge their ideas without some protection. And ideas that go to the grave can be lost forever, defeating one of the purposes of the USPTO of bringing ideas to the light of day. So the most suitable compromise would be to shorten the length of a nonphysical patent (with loophole protection to prevent them being presented in things like ICs which ARE physical) to reflect the speed of that industry (say, 3-5 years at most).

            1. Eric Olson

              Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

              But software and other nonphysical patents live in a world running at breakneck speed, and this length is now inappropriate.

              You could then argue the same for medical patents, mechanical patents, and everything else. The computing era has accelerated everything, not just the software that runs it. By using the "breakneck speed" at which computing changes as a benchmark, how does one measure photolithography? It requires constant evolution to drive down process nodes and is purely mechanical in nature. But it's absolutely vital to the reducing in IC size and pack more into the same sized die to make those nonphysical patents important and useful (another patent requirement kicked to the curb just three years after the original Patent Act). Does that mean it should follow the nonphysical rules as well?

              I'm not just pointing out edge cases. Autonomous vehicles are another example. The deep learning portion is nonphysical, but the basis of those various implementations might live on for decades in cars, drones, etc. Should it be granted only transient protection, even if the product line it first appears in will last for 15+ years? What motivation does Google, MIT, Uber, or others have to patent those algorithms and designs if they know protection might only last a short time.

              Keep in mind a patent is not exclusivity in that you are the only one who can use it. A patent makes a work both easier to license without secrets being stolen while also making it available for others to examine and improve upon, without having to exhaust resources coming to a similar end. Licensing is cheaper than R&D, or allows R&D to focus on something truly novel instead rehashing the same thing. And while this is less of an issue going forward in a first-to-file system, the old way still incentivized trade secrets that could be kept in a war chest and used against a competitor who had the audacity to patent their work. Then you could claim prior art, have the patent invalidated or transferred to you (still not sure how that actually works), and hamstring them.

              1. Charles 9

                Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

                "You could then argue the same for medical patents, mechanical patents, and everything else."

                Not really. Because there's a lot of chemistry, hit-or-miss, and most importantly legal compliance involved, medical developments will necessarily be slow. You basically have to prove your medicine safe by contradiction, and especially in humans, these things take time to make sure you don't miss on long-term consequences. Not to mention in this day and age every single attempt at a new medicine can run easily into nine figures (with no guarantees at all), you soon realize that pharmaceutical companies may be among the most lucrative but also among the most volatile.

                "Autonomous vehicles are another example. The deep learning portion is nonphysical, but the basis of those various implementations might live on for decades in cars, drones, etc. Should it be granted only transient protection, even if the product line it first appears in will last for 15+ years?"

                But they manifest in a physical product. That would be considered worthy of a longer patent. I'm talking about stuff that only exists in programs like pure algorithm patents (remember CompuServe and the GIF tussle?).

                "What motivation does Google, MIT, Uber, or others have to patent those algorithms and designs if they know protection might only last a short time."

                As long as it's long enough, the economics will prompt them to do it. The trick is finding the right length that it's economically worthwhile but not so long as to smother continuing innovation.

                To counter your counter, consider that nonphysical patents are probably the most trolled patents in litigation today. Also why there's a lot of talk about submarine patents and other attempts to stifle competitive innovation. It's a two-way street; protecting your own interests and blocking the competition go hand in hand, and sometimes the give-and-take needs to be re-evaluated.

                1. Eric Olson

                  Re: So if this goes through, everyone has to be sued in their state of incorporation

                  ...nonphysical patents are probably the most trolled patents in litigation today.

                  It might be today, but patent trolling has been around almost as long as patents. Read up on the Sewing Machine Wars of the 1850s for a good look into the troll that begot all trolls, at least in the patent space. Elias Howe, Jr. kicked off the very first war by patenting existing, but undocumented, technology used in almost every sewing machine produced, then went about suing each and every manufacturer, tying up courts, confounding juries, and leading to the formation of the first patent pool to protect those manufactured from him. Howe didn't even produce sewing machines, or have any intent. He just wanted licensing fees and settlements.

                  And while here you might only find non-physical patent trolls, they exist in hardware as well as non-computer spaces. Where ever there is a collection of technologies that people assume were patented years ago and are now common knowledge, you'll find some jerk with deep pockets (or a benefactor with deep pockets) willing to find new ways to extort money. It's not limited to the computer industry. And they don't even have to be good patents, just vague enough to put settlement at the forethought of the lawyers or owner who got just got served.

                  As for defining "long enough", your very definition seems variable and open to modification over time. If a company is sinking $6 billion a year into R&D, they need to be able to tell the shareholders (who might prefer that cash be used for other activities that increase the share price or dividends) the output will provide protection for a finite number of years. As soon as that conversation becomes, "Well, this year it's 7 years, but the USPTO has determined that this sector is up for review next year, so patents might have more or less protection in the coming calendar years," you will have both a revolt and a very definite reexamination of priorities.

  3. Spudley

    If the Supreme Court rules in its favor it would be bad news for the Delaware courts, and catastrophic for the Eastern District of Texas

    There is something fundamentally wrong with that sentence.

    Having fewer cases go through them should not be seen as bad news for a court. Courts are not businesses; they do not exist in order to sell more cases, and they should not be competing with other courts to hear cases.

    It might be bad news for the lawyers who work at those courts, but that's not the same thing as being bad news for the courts.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Unhappy

      The judges have a vested interested in the status quo.

      Few court cases equals few judges.

      So if the judges are friendly to IP owners, then more cases are heard, therefore more judges required.

      Result.

      1. Charles 9

        Isn't a Court of Appeals panel a fixed size, though, somewhere around 13 (at least 3 since that's the minimum needed to hear an appeal)?

    2. Orv Silver badge

      As long as courts collect fees some of them will try to maximize revenue. What are you, some kinda commie? ;)

    3. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

      Extra cases are great business

      The judges cousin owns the hotel were the lawyers are staying. A juror's brother runs the cafe were the lawyers have lunch. In a sparsely populated district, patent litigation related business could account for the majority of the income.

    4. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      "It might be bad news for the lawyers who work at those courts"

      Aren't US judges also lawyers?

  4. jason 7

    I saw a video...

    ...where a guy who created the X-Plane Simulator got sued by a troll and he went to see all the IP companies that create 90% of IP Troll cases. They are all in one town in Texas. Just empty locked office after empty locked office. At the time the main Judge was the father of one of the biggest IP Troll firms CEO.

    Lovely.

    The Simulator guy was being sued because he sold his product on Google Play. The Licensing worked by a look up list and the trolls said that using a list to check licenses was their IP. Not taking on Google by the way...just the little guys.

  5. Kurt 5

    Typo?

    In 1957 the Supremes ruled that a case could only be filed in the defendant's place of incorporation but a 1990 US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decided that cases could be bought wherever the parties do business, which in practice means anywhere in America for anything but the smallest of companies.

    Interesting typo -- intentional?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "a 1990 US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decided that cases could be bought wherever the parties do business"

    I see what you did there.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A pirate once said...

    "I am disinclined to acquiesce to your request." -- Captain Barbossa

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The second ruling came from the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC), the same place for software patents and other shenanigans. [My spellchecker was picking each word of that sentence with two letters or less.] So, we are back to the Supreme Court probably declaring a foul yet again.

    Now if they'd fix Kelo, I could die happy.

  9. Neoc

    <sigh>

    ...and every patent troll company re-incorporates in Texas in 3... 2... 1...

    1. Charles 9

      Re: <sigh>

      The reason companies incorporate in Delaware is because they have probably the most business-friendly tax structure in the country. Being one of the smallest states geographically, and with a fair chunk of it taken by the feds (like Dover Air Force Base), they're doing the same thing Ireland and other small countries do in Europe: offsetting by attracting businesses with favorable taxes.

      Moving to Texas means losing that favorable tax structure (Texas is one of the biggest states, with a sizeable and varied population and lots of people passing through; they basically run things very differently).

  10. goodjudge

    Bonus points for the Michelle Shocked sub-head reference...

    That is all

  11. Adrian Tawse

    The real issue

    Is the vast number of utterly trivial IP patents that have been granted ans seemingly stand unchallenged "a manufactured thing with rounded corners" springs to mind. I wonder if I could patent the letter 'e'. I could be a billionaire within minutes.

    1. Charles 9

      Re: The real issue

      Like I said, it's hard to really vet things on a shoestring budget. Plus they're under orders to grant by default because patents and the like a Constitutionally-listed duty.

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