Patents are entitled to a legal presumption of validity until a court says otherwise (or the PTAB if there is no appeal). So it is what it is.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
VirnetX Wins Another $502.6 Million Award From Apple in Patent Trial
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Patents are entitled to a legal presumption of validity until a court says otherwise (or the PTAB if there is no appeal). So it is what it is.
So if this trillion dollar company with thousands of employees and conections around the globe can't make products then how on earth do you expect independient startups to create prodcuts from all of their ideas. Seems nuts. If anything, "but it’s probably not for a lack of intention" should apply to the smaller guys, not to the biggest multinationals I mean come on...
His example is consistent with the definition, as is yours. Someone who holds a patent and behaves ethically, ie, licensing the patent in a reasonable manner, would not be a troll. Buying a patent with the sole intention of gouging insane licensing fees would be a troll. But also buying patents simply to litigate, without producing any products is patent trolling. I suppose a company could produce products and buy up (or create patents) with no intention of producing a product and attempt to litigate those patents as well. But that would be an exhausting and complex business model to both produce a product for some patents and patent troll others. If they have the resources to actually produce and profit from a patent, it seems they would do so. Even the verge is using patent troll in their articles headline. It seems this company is pretty well known as a patent troll.
I can't argue much about the legality of it, as banning it would set a precedent for people who legitimately produce patents to license to others. But it is definitely a crooked and (in some cases) unethical business practice.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/patent-troll.asp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_troll
https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/10/...litigation-500-million-imessage-facetime-case
After the lawyers are done with the jury selection, there's typically not a single jury member who may have the slightest technical background to understand (even in very broad terms) what the patent describes.
IMHO, patent lawsuits that end up going to a jury trial should be decided by a jury who consists of member who have reasonable technical expertise in the subject matter. It is ironical that the a patent applicant is required to "describe the invention with enough particularity such that those skilled in the art will be able to make, use and understand the invention that was made by the inventor", but jury members who make the final ruling in a lawsuit are specifically selected not to be those skilled in the art and therefore unable to make, use and understand the invention that was made by the inventor.
In TC Heartland v. Kraft Foods Group, the Supreme Court denied litigants the right to file a claim in whatever jurisdiction they desired and ruled that the defendant either be incorporated in the state in which the case is filed or have a regular place of business there.
This was seen as a move to specifically limit the number of patent lawsuits filed in East Texas, however this does not help Apple since they do have multiple retail and other operations in the State of Texas.
Patent law protects small startup companies, and those who invest in them. If you've never developed a novel product with unique technology and started a business, then you won't understand this at all. The business might fail for a number of reasons, but if the technology is valuable then the investment can be recovered through patent licensing.
Without a patent system, innovation would die.
Without a patent system, innovation would die.
The meaning of the terms in the patent is determined by the judge as a matter of law and provided to the jury in layman’s terms, thanks to the supreme court’s Markman decision.
[doublepost=1523408977][/doublepost]
Question whether they have any in the eastern district, though. They seem not to be fighting personal jurisdiction in these cases, so I assume so.
I worded my post carefully specifically to avoid a reply like this. I said the definition includes, meaning that it isn't the full definition. I didn't want to spell out an exhaustive definition, but highlight a key difference between Apple and VirnetX in reply to an absurd comment.
It's not where you sell the product. The patent troll companies set up a "local office" to establish a legal presence there. What they are really doing is renting a cheap office which is not actually occupied and is completely empty and unused. To save money, hundreds of them actually use the same office address.
The town specifically is Marshall, TX. The town receives a heck of a lot of "coincidental" donations and philanthropy from companies that just happen to be involved in patent lawsuits there, which of course are totally-not-bribes.
For example, Samsung out of the goodness of their hearts put in this free ice rink for the town, while coincidentally they were involved in a patent lawsuit there, and they coincidentally put it right in front of the court house.
Other totally-not-bribes include donated monitors, field trips, scholarships, and even straight up cash. Marshall makes out like a bandit from the patent troll business.
And it will be so until Apple releases a sensibly priced modular MacPro and MBP
Exactly.
I'd say the definition of a troll is a non-practicing entity that litigates with the goal of extracting nuisance settlements. In other words, a troll uses the courts to bully their targets into low-value settlements and trolls don't really ever expect to go to trial.
VirnetX, on the flip side, is not clearly not going for mere nuisance settlements but trying to extract actual value from the patent portfolio. They properly analyzed the value of these patents, and they have shown they are willing to go the whole distance.
[doublepost=1523409982][/doublepost]
It's not where you sell the product. The patent troll companies set up a "local office" to establish a legal presence there. What they are really doing is renting a cheap office which is not actually occupied and is completely empty and unused. To save money, hundreds of them actually use the same office address.
The town specifically is Marshall, TX. The town receives a heck of a lot of "coincidental" donations and philanthropy from companies that just happen to be involved in patent lawsuits there, which of course are totally-not-bribes.
For example, Samsung out of the goodness of their hearts put in this free ice rink for the town, while coincidentally they were involved in a patent lawsuit there, and they coincidentally put it right in front of the court house.
Other totally-not-bribes include donated monitors, field trips, scholarships, and even straight up cash. Marshall makes out like a bandit from the patent troll business.
This isn't true anymore, not after the TC Heartland case. http://www.ipwatchdog.com/2017/05/2...l-circuit-tc-heartland-patent-venue/id=83506/
It's not where you sell the product. The patent troll companies set up a "local office" to establish a legal presence there. What they are really doing is renting a cheap office which is not actually occupied and is completely empty and unused. To save money, hundreds of them actually use the same office address.
The town specifically is Marshall, TX. The town receives a heck of a lot of "coincidental" donations and philanthropy from companies that just happen to be involved in patent lawsuits there, which of course are totally-not-bribes.
For example, Samsung out of the goodness of their hearts put in this free ice rink for the town, while coincidentally they were involved in a patent lawsuit there, and they coincidentally put it right in front of the court house.
Other totally-not-bribes include donated monitors, field trips, scholarships, and even straight up cash. Marshall makes out like a bandit from the patent troll business.
Actually, the defendant has to be located in the district too.
Well, anyone who's done even the tiniest bit of research knows that people come up with remarkably similar solutions to common problems, in isolation from one another, all the time. So patent trolling is nothing but ******* irritating, and risks thwarting innovation... Worse, it risks limiting innovation to companies with very deep pockets for paying legal fees (yes, like Apple). And who actually runs off with the money? ******* LAWYERS. What a joke. Infuriating. Besides that, there are probably a dozen ways to do what they're claiming Apple stole, none of which would significantly impact the value of FaceTime, which is entirely down to its simple design and the fact that it's tied into the Apple device ecosystem. The concrete value of the IP is equal to approximately **** all... (Certainly not $1B.)
Angry people who live for the opportunity to try and kick the big kid off the curb. Think of them as 12 dairy cattle waiting to be milked.
Is this why Multi-User FaceTime doesn't exist yet? I was bummed when Messages/iMessage lost this ability a few years ago when it transitioned from iChat. It was really handy for families, for obvious reasons.
Now Apple is an also-ran in the multi-person video chat market when it previously had it locked up.
Oh, and what ever happened to the "Open FaceTime" that Jobs promised us?
Now Apple is an also-ran in the multi-person video chat market when it previously had it locked up.
Oh, and what ever happened to the "Open FaceTime" that Jobs promised us?
Wait, you're comparing those people to cows?Angry people who live for the opportunity to try and kick the big kid off the curb. Think of them as 12 dairy cattle waiting to be milked.
That's really insulting...to cows.
Wrong. In case you've been living under a rock, Apple makes and sell things.
VirnetX doesn't product ANYTHING. ZIP. NADA. ZILCH.