Patent trolls rank right up there with private equity firms that own massive amounts of housing. Scum of the earth right here.
Every time a court finds that the USPTO has issued an invalid patent, they should be given a sizable fine. The patent system won’t work as long as the USPTO has an incentive to turn a blind eye to shit patents.
Don’t punish the taxpayer, punish the troll.
Requiring a government agency to pay a penalty will only ensure the agency will work with less efficiency. In turn, ineffective agencies are further criticized and will become a target for privatization, which only ever serves special interests and those with means.
Put an end to this one and for all. Pass a law that requires any entity which files suit on the basis of being a parent holder must show that they use the patent to earn income from sales that are proven to be independent from them and their officers. If the suit is only being filed for easy money, they should be fined heavily.
Even if they aren’t earning income, they should be able to show they had a product/prototype actually built with the patent before the company they’re using developed their product. That way legitimate patent holders who weren’t able to monetize their technology but had a working prototype will still be able to protect their patents. So many times, patent trolls hold patents to “ideas” rather than working inventions with prototypes.
I had no idea Cloudflare was combating parent trolls!
To clarify, they’re not going after patent trolls afaik, just going to court when they’re targeted by them (instead of forking up a payment to the patent troll company to avoid that). Iirc, the last patent troll they took to court ended up collapsing and isn’t operating anymore.
Yes, that was Blackbird Technologies in 2019 (it’s mentioned in the article).
