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Fark Founder Drew Curtis Explains How Fark Beat a Patent Troll
Velcroman1 links to this coverage of Drew Curtis's explanation of how his company, Fark, managed to beat a patent troll's lawsuit alleging infringement of a patent on distribution of news releases by email. From the article: "It boils down to one thing: don't negotiate with terrorists," Curtis said during a talk at the TED 2012 conference in Long Beach, Calif."
I watched it yesterday and a nice tip is to threaten to make their lives irritating so they can't get an easy win.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
If Fox News' Derp-O-Sphere can label patent trolls as terrorists and inform the pitchfork and shotgun base.... that *might* actually be helpful.
Why wouldn't you want the truth?
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120418/04260518542/farks-drew-curtis-explains-how-to-beat-patent-troll-live-to-tell-tale.shtml
The fox news audience has damaged reasoning facilities. Fact and logic aren't their truth, and you have to communicate with them with that in mind.
Saying "Patent lawsuit entities cause harm to the industry by filling lawsuits with vague patents, etc." Gets you nowhere.
Saying "Patent trolls are turrists!!!" Will.
Finally! An unbiased, true American news source! Bout time we got some real news instead of some LAMEstream media "facts".
To all you virgins: Thanks for nothing.
As do Fox news bashers who don't watch enough to actually know what the hell they're talking about; it's mostly groupthink, and to a great many liberals, a different viewpoint is construed as a lie. You assign solely to FN those attributes which other news channels suffer from.
They more or less are economic terrorist. Now if we can get Obama to nuke them from orbit we'll get somewhere.
The original posting of the TED talk and subsequent discussion is at http://www.fark.com/comments/7055377/Drews-TED-talk-is-up-How-I-Beat-a-Patent-Troll.
I see enough fox news from fark and the daily show to know they're a joke.
"The patent troll realized we were going to fight them instead of settle, so they asked for our best offer. I said, how about you get nothing and drop the lawsuit? They accepted" - Drew Curtis
True patent trolls, entities that solely exist to acquire patent portfolios and weaponize them for profit, do not know anything about the content of the actual patent. I mean, sure, they might read one or two and quote whichever small pieces they understand of them, but just like we techies struggle with legalese, lawyers struggle with technical documentation. If the case is strong enough, or has a very high earning potential, they will enlist the help of a technical consultant. This is a guy like you and I who will interpret and vulgarize the patent's claims into lay-speak. Now, most lawyers are pretty sharp, but they're not engineers. Their skills are honed differently, to such a degree that even a lawyer that specialized in tech IP cases will have a very hard time truly understanding the subtleties of why X database is different from Y. Since we techies aren't always favorable to lawyers and their destructive pursuits, they have to incentivize with money. The tech expert will be paid an hourly consulting fee, often supplemented with a settlement bonus if they win, as further incentive to provide competitive insight to benefit the troll.
The thing to remember about patent suits is they often are carried out by people who didn't write the patent application, don't understand it, don't even have the slightest clue how it's intented to work. If they don't have access to the guy who actually invented the patented thingy, they're relying on low quality information. The people who are being sued are, by definition, working in the field and possess far more expert knowledge than their tormentors. They just look for any language they can abuse, and they know the very threat of litigation is their greatest asset, because an actual court battle means going toe-to-toe with other tech experts who are NOT on the troll's payroll.
As a defendant, if you do your homework about the plaintiff and find they're in this position of technical inferiority, Drew Curtis' tactic can work very well. Call their bluff!
Disclaimer: I used to work at a law firm, and was occasionally called upon as a technical consultant on IP suits. Can't tell you which, but it was one of the reasons why I left. I tolerate most lawyers but I despise patent trolls.
Actually it was Drew Curtis who referred to them as terrorists.
Apparently your reasoning facilities were too damaged to RTFA, fact and logic aren't your truth and I have to communicate to you with that in mind.
Did it settle or fight?
Umm, how do you record a letter
SANE
and play it back later?
CUPS
Wow, I felt goosebumps on hearing the "Don't negotiate with terrorists line". In an ideal world, I suppose big tech would see the societal costs which accrue by settling with trolls. Sigh....
...a different viewpoint is construed as a lie.
Also a lie is construed as a lie. And lies is what what Fox News does. They even had to defend in court their right to broadcast lies and still call themselves "News". And since they cannot be called "news", please refrain from comparing them to "news channels".
Has *anyone* ever fought back asserting that by Article 1, section 8(8) specifically says "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors", and since trolls is neither the author nor inventor, nor to they use the material of the patent to produce the product of the patent, their claim to the patent is invalid?
mark
The appeal of fark ended when they started shadowbanning people for even mentioning competing sites, while still continuing to take their money if they were paid subscribers. The best way to get people to stop caring about a site is to treat the users like shit.
Everything will be taken away from you.
A bigger factor was when Curtis turned it into a blog for bashing Bush/Palin/Republicans/Fox News. It happened pretty suddenly and coincided with an overhaul of the site and restrictions on NSFW posts. Really looked like he was on someone's payroll (*cough* George Soros *cough*). Him appearing on TED to give such an obvious talk makes that connection even stronger.
LOL, now George Soros is behind Fark, too? Is there anything he ISN'T behind nowadays?
Wasn't the Supreme Court's recent Bilski ruling supposed to liberate us from ridiculous patent litigation like this? If someone slaps you with this kind of lawsuit, you should definitely hit back. Good on Mr. Curtis!