Think patent disputes are just for big corporations?

[Glaucus]

Think again.

In fact, it seems it's far more lucrative to threaten smaller companies that are less likely to afford a legal fight. And the fact that the patents in question are ridiculous and easily invalided with prior art is irrelevant. It's a growing concern and we may start to even see individuals targeted as well.


Patent trolls want $1,000—for using scanners

When Steven Vicinanza got a letter in the mail earlier this year informing him that he needed to pay $1,000 per employee for a license to some “distributed computer architecture” patents, he didn’t quite believe it at first. The letter seemed to be saying anyone using a modern office scanner to scan documents to e-mail would have to pay—which is to say, just about any business, period.

Apple and Samsung made some big waves this year with patent wars, and many people have come to the conclusion that the whole patent system is broke. But this here is the real reason why we need to take a very close look at it. As far as I can tell, we're probably better off with no patent system at all, or at least, one that has been greatly weakened.

 

[FluffyMcDeath]

As far as I can tell, we're probably better off with no patent system at all, or at least, one that has been greatly weakened.

We don't really have a patent system anyway. We have a shake-down racket. After budget cuts and legal spats the US patent office doesn't even bother reading software patents (and/or process patents and maybe a bunch of others) because they "don't have the expertise" so they just rubber stamp patents and let the courts sort it out. It's total madness and the whole system is so abused and broken it should just be scrapped.