Patent Trolls Are Losing More. Will America's Supreme Court Change That? (nytimes.com)

jespada writes: New York Times has an article warning that the Patent Appeal and Trial Board is being challenged on the basis that patents represent real property and that a government agency is not empowered to take real property.
Here's a quotes from the Times article. (Non-paywalled version here): In the five years since it began its work -- a result of the America Invents Act of 2011 -- the Patent Trial and Appeal Board has saved companies more than $2 billion in legal fees alone, according to Joshua Landau, patent counsel at the Computer and Communications Industry Association, offering an expeditious and relatively cheap avenue to challenge patents of doubtful validity. The benefits of stopping bad patents from snaking their way through the economy have been even greater. Companies no longer have to pay ransom so the threat of lawsuits over dubious royalty payments -- filed by aggressive litigants known as trolls -- will go away... But for all the benefits of culling faulty intellectual-property rights, the board is under existential threat. Next week, the Supreme Court will hear a challenge that the patent office's new procedure is unconstitutional...

Comments

Property taxes?

[Just Some Guy]

If patents are real property, and a company testifies in court that theirs is with a billion dollars, then surely they’ve been paying property taxes on that $1B, right? Because if not, you and I are subsidizing their welfare queen asses by paying our taxes to support the court system that they are using to enforce their “property” rights.

I don’t want to hear a damn thing from a patent holding company until they show tax returns demonstrating that they’re paying their fair share to maintain the legal system they disproportionately consume.

Re:Property taxes?

[dk20]

Exactly! Either it is property or it isnt.. While in Connecticut i had to pay property taxes on my car even, yet billion dollar "patent portfolios" are property but tax exempt?

The worst part is exactly what you hit upon. Offshore all the profits to avoid paying taxes but sure love the legal system when it is time to sue for patent money..

Re:Property taxes?

[Just Some Guy]

Court fees cover a teensy part of the government that protects those rights. I pay all sorts of fees for my home, too, but that doesn’t get me out of paying property taxes on it. As far as I can tell, this is yet another way for corporations to avoid the taxes that the rest of us have to pay.

Re:Property taxes?

[BankRobberMBA]

Rather, let's hope sanity breaks out in the SCOTUS and they point out that patents are merely PROTECTIONS GRANTED by the feds. As such, they are not, and cannot ever be, real property.

This would be a great outcome, both in terms of stopping patent trolls and in terms of eventually simplifying the patent grant/challenge system.

Re:Property taxes?

[Wrath0fb0b]

I can't believe this was modded up.

There is no general blanket tax on property in the US. A very limited form of property (real estate, and in very few States cars) are subject to tax, but that absolutely doesn't apply to any asset that has value. Think about it, do you have to declare your Playstation or 3D printer as property and pay the IRS every year?

So they are not "surely been paying property taxes" and you won't find it on their tax returns because no part of the tax code actually says anything they have to pay anything remotely like this.

[ FWIW, I'm not even unsympathetic to the idea that we should change the law to have such a tax, depending on lots of details. But to say "how dare they pay a tax that doesn't exist" is placing things complete backwards. ]

I'll accept that logic

[king neckbeard]

I'll accept that logic as soon as they also acknowledge that "a government agency is not empowered to create real property," meaning all patents are invalid, and we can shut down the PATB due to it no longer being needed.

Re:Yes, it will

[king neckbeard]

The entire reason we have any protections against trolls is completely because the big companies get sued by trolls. That's why patent apologists are always making the BS claim that patent reform is just to allow the big guys to rip off the little guys. These reforms are enough to hinder trolls, but not enough to make their massive warchests useless.

Thanks to pj and Groklaw

[Cutterman]

If the patent trolls have retreated under their bridges and judges and juries are more awake about patent abuse and IP extortion then I think we all owe a great dept of thanks to pj and Groklaw - http://www.groklaw.net/

Way back in 2003, Darl McBride thought that his company SCO (pretending to be the defunct Santa Cruz Operation) decided on a scan to monetize Linux, through some disputed Novell IP.

pj, a paralegal, aided by a growing cohort of assistants, tracked down and followed every slimy twist and turn of the multiple cases brought by SCO against Novell, IBM and several others. They dug up so much forgotten information, case-law and witnesses that even the lawyers admitted to using Groklaw as a source.

Eventually it was decided that Novell did in fact own the IP in question, and "millions of lines of :copied code" turned out to be a couple of headers of no consequence.

Finally Darl's dreams of wealth beyond belief collapsed and SCO went into bankruptcy.

The whole saga, and SCO's ultimate ignominious collapse, was a big wake-up call for patent/IP trolls and Groklaw played no small part in it.

Groklaw stopped in 2013 because their messenger anonymizer was forced to close, but their archives are still online.

We owe a big dept of thanks to pj and Groklaw

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