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Beware the King of the Patent Trolls
superapecommando writes "If you haven't heard of Intellectual Ventures, you may want to check this out. Set up by ex-Microsoftie Nathan Myhrvold, with investments from Microsoft among others, it is basically a patenting machine – filing and buying them in huge quantities. Note that it doesn't actually use these patents – except to threaten people with. In other words, Intellectual Ventures is a patent troll – or, rather the King of the Patent Trolls. So I was interested to come across this extremely positive blog post on the company. That it is so positive is hardly surprising, since the blog is called 'Tangible IP,' and subtitled 'ipVA's blog on adding value through intellectual property.' Nonetheless, it provides valuable insights into the mindset of fans of intellectual monopolies. Here's what it says about Intellectual Ventures: 'They are an invention house, and have adopted and reinvented leading edge patent strategies to create a portfolio of their own IP which, in its own, would be of high high worth.' They don't invent anything in the proper, deep sense of the word; they merely file and buy patents – with no intent of ever making stuff or solving real-life problems."
If you haven't heard of Intellectual Ventures, you will do.
Is that some sort of threat?
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
The problem lies with profit, man. It's evil to want to be paid. In the new reality, right-thinking people give away everything.
[citation needed]
Here's a cookie... *psst* it's MAGIC
Reasonable timeframe, reasonable period of time?
Heck, since we're using weasel words anyway, let's just reduce all laws to:"You are free to do anything as long as it's reasonable.
Better?
Set your phasers on "funky"!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Is that report from the same Federal Reserve that *enabled* the whole US economy to go into the dumpster recently?
Oh yeah, that's a reputable source of economic data.