I'm not as interested in the part about indemnifying use of open source software. It's not worthless though: Google did something similar for Android developers

I'm not as interested in the part about indemnifying use of open source software. It's not worthless though: Google did something similar for Android developers when Oracle started suing (which is a much more recent example than SCO, so it does still happen). Also, my guess is that mid-to-large organizations do see patent suits on a regular basis and that most of them are never made public. So we wouldn't necessarily know how common this is. Either way, the "patent pick" part is more interesting to me. It gives you some protection for stuff you write yourself. Quick story: I was working at a BigCo about 10 years ago and was told I couldn't embed some HTML in a javascript string and dynamically inject it into the DOM because "that was patented" and "we've been sued for doing that before." Patent pick could help defend against bullshit like that (assuming the litigant is not an NPE).