10 ms·

Patent troll stalks travel site Hipmunk

188 points by chewymouse 14y ago

droithomme 14y ago
Arg, I just read the 1992 era patent and I am not sure what exactly the novel part of it is. Possibly it claims to patent a specific implementation of model-view-controller. This stuff is written so obtusely it's hard to imagine what specific claims of the things it describes is it really patenting. Disturbing is the large number of other patents that reference it. No doubt anything we do in the course of developing software violates some claim made in some patent somewhere that few have even heard of.
randomfool 14y ago
I hate patents, but sometimes I wish that judges would just say that yes, the software does infringe, but that the patent represents one itsy bitsy tiny part of what's needed to make a successful product. Then award the patent holder what their patent is worth- $1. I often think that the issue isn't so much the patents, but the absurd amounts of money people are able to extract from them- the money is in no way representative of the importance of the invention.
- asmithmd1 14y ago
  It is time for compulsary licensing of patents - just like there is with songs. With compsary licensing there would be no need to talk with a patent owner, just pay the license fee. This is how any band can "cover" any song. Congress thought songs were so important to our culture no one person should be able to control them and forced song authors to license their works to anyone who asks.
opendns 14y ago
We've taken the same approach. Suing first. The problem is that all you've done is declare venue. You'll still need to settle because not settling will cost you at least $1mm to fight this in court. And if you win, and find yourself not to be infringing, they can just find another patent and start the process all over again. You'll never get your legal fees back. That's not how patent suits work. That's why it's such a scam. I'd just settle and view it as a tax on innovation while working on changing the larger patent system.
- larrys 14y ago
  Can you reveal what the troll was asking for the license in your particular case?
arturadib 14y ago
I am getting on a plane and won't have internet access for days, but can someone please start a site like IAmATroll.com or whatever and compile a list - hopefully with profile pictures - of patent trollers, and who they're suing. I'd be happy to help promote and maintain it when I'm back. If we can't win legally, let's at least try a grassroots approach. Perhaps shame will have some effect on these people.
- JoshTriplett 14y ago
  Why would you think shame would have any effect? Shame does not lose court cases or reduce patent licensing fees. You can't stop a patent troll by any means that does not directly affect their revenue.
  - arturadib 14y ago
    The "green" movement seems to be making some progress.
    - sharkweek 14y ago
      From a very cynical perspective -- a lot of that is still profit driven.
      - regularfry 14y ago
        If turning a profit and a moral goal are aligned, so much the better.
    - JoshTriplett 14y ago
      "Green" has successfully affected revenue: people value green products and green companies, and "green" affects purchasing decisions. Patent trolls, by definition, have no products to purchase and no interaction with consumers; how consumers view them will have no effect on their revenue. Name-and-shame tactics don't help. Massive public opinion campaigns could still prove useful in this case, but only insofar as they affect the legislative and judicial systems that support patents and patent trolls.
RedwoodCity 14y ago
The last patent reform bill really did nothing. Why can't congress pass useful bills.
cft 14y ago
It's a very dangerous precedent for the whole startup ecosystem. Much like a venture capitalist, the troll is trying to get a share of a growing stratup, except that it's using racketeering, rather than an investment as its tactics. This needs to be stopped decisively, ideally adding the troll to vexatious litigant list, so that it cannot racketeer again with another patent http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation http://www.courts.ca.gov/12272.htm http://www.courts.ca.gov/12272.htm
BryanB55 14y ago
Maybe we should all message this guy on linkedin and tell him what a scumbag he is.. Just in case he doesn't already know. I really wish more people would spend more time doing something valuable in the world.
kinkora 14y ago
The problem with the current patent system is that it treats all patents from various industries (software, manufacturing, biology, chemistry, science, business, etc) exactly the same across the board and applies the exact same rules to all of them. While an overhaul of the whole patent ecosystem is needed and long overdue, I think the quickest/easiest way we can get rid of majority of patent trolls is to start having different rules for different categories of patents. A couple of examples I can think of: 1. A patent with a tangible product will last for 20 years but a software patent should only last for no more than 5 years. 2. A medical methodology process can only be patented by an individual/company after showing evidence of the research put into it by said individual/company where else a software methodology process can only be patented if the patent holder is actually utilizing the patent as part of their business. 3. Manufacturing patents can be granted without actually showing the actual real-life process (and obviously it needs to be a novel approach and has no prior art) but all software patents need to be developed and attached a demo of the software patent in action (not just pictures and descriptions) as part of the requirement for the patent to be granted. What do you guys think? I believe setting different rules for different categories will quickly elevate majority of our tech patent woes.
- mcao 14y ago
  I completely agree. Our legal system already has varying sentences for different crimes. Can you imagine a world where you always get 20 years in jail for every crime, from petty theft to murder?
- runako 14y ago
  Feedback: #1 devalues genuine software innovation. If a software innovation is genuine, why is it worth less protection? I understand that software moves faster than tangible products, but that just means "innovation" means something different in software. As a programmer, I oppose any effort to devalue software relative to other intellectual pursuits. #2 Devalues genius. If a genius only needs 2 weeks to produce real genuine medical innovation, it should not be measured against some arbitrary measured effort standard quantifying "evidence of research". #2 Also enforces arbitrary business requirements on software-using firms. Why can't a firm invent a lot of stuff and not implement it all at once? They should have the same rights to use their inventions as firms that work in other pursuits. (Again, this is dependent on the innovations being genuine.) #3 Devalues software relative to manufacturing by applying a different standard. These are hard problems that I can't answer at the moment; I'll freely admit that. But I continue to be shocked that the programming community tends to put forth answers that devalue its efforts, so I feel the need to point out that software is as worthy of protection as other fields. (This is a shocking argument to have to make to software people!) If there's a problem with the patent system, fix it across the board: software is not the problem.
robomartin 14y ago
I've proposed this a couple of times on HN. I think the solution to these issues is for someone of note to start an organization dedicated to fighting patent troll cases. To be considered for protection you have to become a member and pay annual dues. Such an organization could potentially raise hundreds of millions of dollars and have top-notch legal horsepower available. It's mission would be to defend members and, in all cases, seek the invalidation of the patents in question. If something like that existed, trolls would know that the potential consequence of trying to enforce bullshit patents would be huge financial losses and the potential invalidation of their bullshit patents. How many trolls would go up against an organization with 10, 20, 50 or 100 million dollars available to take-on a case? I am saddened to say that it is an arms race. Given that, true entrepreneurs and startups need bigger guns. It would behoove VC's and virtually all entrepreneurs and startups to help fund and support such an entity. It would be like patent reform approached in a very different way. Knowing that the "nuclear option" is on the table could very well bring reason to a landscape that is simply full of land-mines. There would have to be a mechanism through which companies of a certain size (Google, Apple, etc.) are excluded from receiving free services from this organization. They would, however, be expected to support it with generous donations. If the large players in the tech would each donated ten million dollars a year (a rounding error in their revenue stream) to such an entity, the organization could easily raise hundreds of millions in no time at all.
- vellum 14y ago
  Good idea, but how would you determine who is a "patent troll"? Some of them are more obvious, like i2z. But 1-click is also a bullshit patent. Big companies like Amazon like to use patents both defensively and offensively. They're not going to contribute to the legal fund if it could be used against them. I think the idea is more workable if you start with recruiting small to mid-size companies + VCs. The big companies are more likely to join on a case by case basis, especially with someone else taking point.
  - robomartin 14y ago
    The organization would have to put into place a process through which requests for help from members are evaluated. If the lawsuit in question is determined to fit the stated mission, purpose and standards of the organization they take over. There could also be staged levels of paid assistance whereby the organization might handle the case at a much-reduced cost when compared to going through other avenues. I don't have all the answers. Legal minds far more capable than mine would design a set of rules and options that would make this a true resource and, to use the term again, a "nuclear option" against trolls. I don't have a problem with the reasonable enforcement of legitimate patents, but the bullshit patents need a way to hurt those using them to troll in a major way. All you need is a few cases of trolls getting utterly destroyed in court for the environment to change completely.
astrodust 14y ago
Although I'm entirely opposed to patents, a way to limit the exposure of companies to patent trolls if if these trolls need to quantify their "damages" in terms of lost sales or lost opportunities. If they're not actively developing products, that is certainly going to be hard to prove.
- karamazov 14y ago
  This presents a problem for legitimate patents - researchers and others who develop technology would only be able to profit from it by bringing it to production themselves, rather than selling or licensing the technology to others and continuing to do research.
  - JoshTriplett 14y ago
    Can you write any description that reliably distinguishes between a patent troll and anyone else who does not use the patent themselves in production (commonly called a "non-practicing entity" (NPE))? If not, that should tell you something. (Not that practicing entities can't resemble patent trolls too, as evidenced by the numerous ongoing smartphone lawsuits.)
    - karamazov 14y ago
      The issue with patent trolls isn't how they use patents - it's the patents that they use. There's nothing wrong with a researcher suing a factory over a patent the researcher holds that the factory is using without license. There's also nothing wrong with the researcher selling the patent to a lawyer, so as to avoid dealing with the legal system, and that lawyer then suing the factory. This works if the patent was issued for a meaningful advance. In fact, the researcher may not have been interested in doing the research (or at least in revealing his methodology) without patent protection. If the methodology were not revealed, other people would need to spend the time to develop their own process, when it would be easier for them to pay the researcher and then use his work. The issue with software patents is that the methodologies covered are trivial, and the time needed to develop your own method is trivial as well. Because the patents are granted for obvious solutions, many people end up violating the patent without ever having seen it; this is why patents are not supposed to be granted for obvious developments.
spez 14y ago
It's a stupid claim, and we're taking the most agressive action we can against it, which in this case means suing them first.
- iamandrus 14y ago
  I agree. "Displaying data in multiple computer windows" is an absolutely ridiculous patent. I know you guys can win this, best of luck! :)
  - ceol 14y ago
    According to the article, the patent is for a method and system for synchronizing the presentation of data from different, but related, sources in different windows of a computer display It looks like this is person patented having multiple windows display related data in an organized fashion. Just as ridiculous, but differently so! And almost as vague.
  - cperciva 14y ago
    "Displaying data in multiple computer windows" is an absolutely ridiculous patent. It would indeed be ridiculous if someone had a patent on displaying data in multiple computer windows, but that's not what was patented. Here's claim #1 -- the other claims are similar in their specificity: 1. A system for synchronizing the presentation of data on a digital computer display, comprising: first and second window-controlling means, each of said window-controlling means displaying information in at least one display window, a synchronization control means, and means for communications between said synchronization control means and each of said first and second window-controlling means; wherein said first window-controlling means displays first information from a first source, and said second window-controlling means displays second information from a second source; wherein said first information and said second information have sections, and at least one section of said second information corresponds to a section of said first information; wherein said first window-controlling means sends a message to said synchronization control means over said means for communications indicating a change in viewing position to a new section of said first information; wherein said synchronization control means sends a message to said second window-controlling means over said means for communications requesting a change in viewing position to a section of said second information corresponding to said new section of said first information; and wherein said second window-controlling means displays said corresponding section of said second information on at least one display window. Remember, patents cover methods, not purposes. This patent covers a specific method for displaying data in multiple windows, not the general concept of displaying data in multiple windows. Mind you, I still think it's a dumb patent. But let's make sure we understand what we're lynching them for before we get out the torches and pitchforks, ok?
phil 14y ago
This is a 1994 patent. Looks like it should be expiring in Nov. Better hurry up with that suit, patent troll!
- dctoedt 14y ago
  November 9 does in fact appear to be the expiration date, that is, 20 years after the first filing date [1, 2]. The patent owner can still sue for damages for pre-expiration infringement, going back six years (which is the statute of limitations). But damages for infringement won't continue to accrue after expiration. In addition, any injunction against infringement would expire automatically with the patent. [1] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/search-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&RefSrch=yes&Query=PN/5345551 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&Sec... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent_in_the_United_St...
mapster 14y ago
Trolls likely will settle out of court. I hope Hipmunk doesn't fall for this trap either.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
grellas 14y ago
A few thoughts: 1. The complaint here presents Hipmunk as the developer of an innovative travel search engine that offers something great that no one has ever offered and, hence, as a rising star in its market. It contrasts this with i2z Technology, LLC, - a Marshall, Texas shell entity run by a Silicon Valley lawyer - that invented nothing through its own efforts, that took an assignment of a soon-to-expire 1992 patent in July, 2011, that sued a score of mostly-large companies in the fall of 2011 for allegedly infringing that patent, and that made a letter demand on Hipmunk to take a license from it or be immediately sued. It notes, very pointedly, that the innovation done by Hipmunk from which so many people stand to benefit has no connection whatever with the patent upon which i2z threatens to sue. It further notes that, on the face of it, the primary claim of the patent in issue deals with two-window configurations not even used by Hipmunk. And it identifies prior art that Hipmunk claims invalidates the patent. Finally, the complaint states that this demand came to Hipmunk only after it had raised significant VC funding for the purpose of continuing to grow and to innovate and, rather than use these funds to pay for a worthless "license," it has instead elected to fight to expose this for the bogus claim that it is. 2. The themes of the complaint are almost a template for what is wrong with U.S. software patents at their worst. Patents are supposed to protect and encourage innovation. They are supposed to take things that would otherwise remain secret and get inventors to disclose this secret know-how so that it can be absorbed into an ever-broadening public pool of knowledge for society's benefit and, as a trade-off, give the inventor a limited monopoly barring all others from using the invention for a limited time even if those others developed it entirely independently of the efforts of the inventor. To get this monopoly protection, the innovation has to be truly inventive and not such that those skilled in the relevant art would see it as obvious in light of prior art; and it must be practical and useful as applied to real-world activities and cannot be so abstract and vague that it amounts to an idea, a law of nature, or a mere concept. To benefit society, the monopoly protection must extend to a point deemed reasonable for rewarding the inventor but not so long as to give him a windfall at the longer-term expense of others. All of these concepts applied beautifully to an industrial age where inventions tended to be tied to heavy machinery or to other innovation tied to long and expensive development cycles and where the resulting inventions were discrete and significant departures from the analog-style forms of prior art that preceded them. 3. Digital technology, when first deployed, tended to fit within the historical patterns but not so with software. When it comes to software development, development cycles have become extremely rapid. The ability, or even the inventor's desire, to keep innovation secret and undisclosed has severely contracted and, in a sense, much of what is innovative in software is an open book, with a whole universe of developers drawing from the same or similar sources and deriving very similar outcomes without reference to one another's work. Change comes quickly and incrementally and knowledge of that change rapidly becomes widespread. Often such changes, when reduced to practice, can only be described in vague ways that might be applied in all sorts of surprising ways to future incremental changes and, hence, the monopoly rights tied to such vagaries hang like a menacing cloud over anything that anybody might do in those areas. And even things that truly might be classified as inventive in light of prior art can be seen as being of very limited value in the broader swirl of rapid technological change within even a few years of the time they are given patent protection and hence giving every appearance of society's having given the inventor a 20-year windfall over what should instead have been incremental stuff worthy of 3-year protection at most. Now add to the mix an underfunded and besieged patent office whose examiners are not particularly qualified to make consistent, astute judgments about innovation involving software and who are effectively under quota-pressure to keep the patent grants moving along in the system - add further an enforcement system that imposes multi-million dollar costs upon those who seek to enforce their patents and also upon those who seek to defend against claims of infringement and that produces widely variable results tied to a jury system in which those passing the ultimate judgment can easily be confused and bamboozled in evaluating technical claims - add further that the appellate review level concerning patents has been placed in the hands of a specialized court having exceedingly close and sympathetic ties with the patent bar and with the idea of broad-based patent enforcement remedies (including potentially crippling injunctions) - add further that a specialized judicial district in a backwater Texas area routinely provides favorable treatment for patent claimants even when claims are weak or frivolous - add further that patent rights, being freely assignable, can be gathered in the hands of shell entities having no connection with any form of innovation but being intimately tied to a system whose purpose is to play the enforcement system to its maximum value in order to force parties to pay up or get swept into a litigation mess - yes, added all together, this becomes one lethal brew whose poisons now maim or kill, rather than encourage, the innovation that the patent system was designed to foster. 4. I am by no means hostile to IP rights generally. These can and do protect various forms of creative effort in ways that can benefit society. Still, IP rights when abused are the worst form of perverseness in a technologically-driven society and can and do damage society in serious ways. You wind up with those who have not innovated a day in their lives making debilitating demands on those engaged in brilliant innovation in furtherance of a cynical shake-down process that amounts to a toll on innovation with no offsetting benefits. The patent system has served the U.S. well for over 200 years. Its structure was put in place with the pace and methods of innovation fostered by the industrial revolution. That structure did not envision digital technology as embodied in software and has in the past 20 years become corrupted. It is time for a rethinking of what it takes in the patent area to encourage and protect software innovation. The current system, as exemplified in the Hipmunk case, is absurdly broken.
rhizome 14y ago
One can only hope that the previous licensees included a clawback-if-invalidated clause in their agreements.
sneak 14y ago
Did anyone else cringe at Hipmunk's use of the phrase "hard-earned venture capital"?
wpietri 14y ago
I can only hope that VCs are clubbing together to give patent trolls a good thrashing. Partly through lobbying; Congress should be sympathetic to innovation and job creation, especially during a downturn. And partly through a vigorous collective defense. Patent trolls turn their extorted money into more patents and more lawsuits. Like any parasite, the smart approach is to kill them early.
Fando 14y ago
i2z Technology = Loser
kn0thing 14y ago
Relevant: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/drew_curtis_how_i_beat_a_patent_troll.html http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/drew_curtis_how_i_beat_a_pa...

188 points by chewymouse 14y ago

Arg, I just read the 1992 era patent and I am not sure what exactly the novel part of it is. Possibly it claims to patent a specific implementation of model-view-controller. This stuff is written so obtusely it's hard to imagine what specific claims of the things it describes is it really patenting. Disturbing is the large number of other patents that reference it. No doubt anything we do in the course of developing software violates some claim made in some patent somewhere that few have even heard of.

randomfool 14y ago

I hate patents, but sometimes I wish that judges would just say that yes, the software does infringe, but that the patent represents one itsy bitsy tiny part of what's needed to make a successful product. Then award the patent holder what their patent is worth- $1. I often think that the issue isn't so much the patents, but the absurd amounts of money people are able to extract from them- the money is in no way representative of the importance of the invention.

asmithmd1 14y ago
It is time for compulsary licensing of patents - just like there is with songs. With compsary licensing there would be no need to talk with a patent owner, just pay the license fee. This is how any band can "cover" any song. Congress thought songs were so important to our culture no one person should be able to control them and forced song authors to license their works to anyone who asks.

opendns 14y ago

We've taken the same approach. Suing first. The problem is that all you've done is declare venue. You'll still need to settle because not settling will cost you at least $1mm to fight this in court. And if you win, and find yourself not to be infringing, they can just find another patent and start the process all over again. You'll never get your legal fees back. That's not how patent suits work. That's why it's such a scam. I'd just settle and view it as a tax on innovation while working on changing the larger patent system.

larrys 14y ago
Can you reveal what the troll was asking for the license in your particular case?

arturadib 14y ago

I am getting on a plane and won't have internet access for days, but can someone please start a site like IAmATroll.com or whatever and compile a list - hopefully with profile pictures - of patent trollers, and who they're suing. I'd be happy to help promote and maintain it when I'm back. If we can't win legally, let's at least try a grassroots approach. Perhaps shame will have some effect on these people.

JoshTriplett 14y ago
Why would you think shame would have any effect? Shame does not lose court cases or reduce patent licensing fees. You can't stop a patent troll by any means that does not directly affect their revenue.
- arturadib 14y ago
  The "green" movement seems to be making some progress.
  - sharkweek 14y ago
    From a very cynical perspective -- a lot of that is still profit driven.
    - regularfry 14y ago
      If turning a profit and a moral goal are aligned, so much the better.
  - JoshTriplett 14y ago
    "Green" has successfully affected revenue: people value green products and green companies, and "green" affects purchasing decisions. Patent trolls, by definition, have no products to purchase and no interaction with consumers; how consumers view them will have no effect on their revenue. Name-and-shame tactics don't help. Massive public opinion campaigns could still prove useful in this case, but only insofar as they affect the legislative and judicial systems that support patents and patent trolls.

RedwoodCity 14y ago

The last patent reform bill really did nothing. Why can't congress pass useful bills.

cft 14y ago

It's a very dangerous precedent for the whole startup ecosystem. Much like a venture capitalist, the troll is trying to get a share of a growing stratup, except that it's using racketeering, rather than an investment as its tactics. This needs to be stopped decisively, ideally adding the troll to vexatious litigant list, so that it cannot racketeer again with another patent http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vexatious_litigation http://www.courts.ca.gov/12272.htm http://www.courts.ca.gov/12272.htm

BryanB55 14y ago

Maybe we should all message this guy on linkedin and tell him what a scumbag he is.. Just in case he doesn't already know. I really wish more people would spend more time doing something valuable in the world.

kinkora 14y ago

The problem with the current patent system is that it treats all patents from various industries (software, manufacturing, biology, chemistry, science, business, etc) exactly the same across the board and applies the exact same rules to all of them. While an overhaul of the whole patent ecosystem is needed and long overdue, I think the quickest/easiest way we can get rid of majority of patent trolls is to start having different rules for different categories of patents. A couple of examples I can think of: 1. A patent with a tangible product will last for 20 years but a software patent should only last for no more than 5 years. 2. A medical methodology process can only be patented by an individual/company after showing evidence of the research put into it by said individual/company where else a software methodology process can only be patented if the patent holder is actually utilizing the patent as part of their business. 3. Manufacturing patents can be granted without actually showing the actual real-life process (and obviously it needs to be a novel approach and has no prior art) but all software patents need to be developed and attached a demo of the software patent in action (not just pictures and descriptions) as part of the requirement for the patent to be granted. What do you guys think? I believe setting different rules for different categories will quickly elevate majority of our tech patent woes.

mcao 14y ago
I completely agree. Our legal system already has varying sentences for different crimes. Can you imagine a world where you always get 20 years in jail for every crime, from petty theft to murder?
runako 14y ago
Feedback: #1 devalues genuine software innovation. If a software innovation is genuine, why is it worth less protection? I understand that software moves faster than tangible products, but that just means "innovation" means something different in software. As a programmer, I oppose any effort to devalue software relative to other intellectual pursuits. #2 Devalues genius. If a genius only needs 2 weeks to produce real genuine medical innovation, it should not be measured against some arbitrary measured effort standard quantifying "evidence of research". #2 Also enforces arbitrary business requirements on software-using firms. Why can't a firm invent a lot of stuff and not implement it all at once? They should have the same rights to use their inventions as firms that work in other pursuits. (Again, this is dependent on the innovations being genuine.) #3 Devalues software relative to manufacturing by applying a different standard. These are hard problems that I can't answer at the moment; I'll freely admit that. But I continue to be shocked that the programming community tends to put forth answers that devalue its efforts, so I feel the need to point out that software is as worthy of protection as other fields. (This is a shocking argument to have to make to software people!) If there's a problem with the patent system, fix it across the board: software is not the problem.

robomartin 14y ago

I've proposed this a couple of times on HN. I think the solution to these issues is for someone of note to start an organization dedicated to fighting patent troll cases. To be considered for protection you have to become a member and pay annual dues. Such an organization could potentially raise hundreds of millions of dollars and have top-notch legal horsepower available. It's mission would be to defend members and, in all cases, seek the invalidation of the patents in question. If something like that existed, trolls would know that the potential consequence of trying to enforce bullshit patents would be huge financial losses and the potential invalidation of their bullshit patents. How many trolls would go up against an organization with 10, 20, 50 or 100 million dollars available to take-on a case? I am saddened to say that it is an arms race. Given that, true entrepreneurs and startups need bigger guns. It would behoove VC's and virtually all entrepreneurs and startups to help fund and support such an entity. It would be like patent reform approached in a very different way. Knowing that the "nuclear option" is on the table could very well bring reason to a landscape that is simply full of land-mines. There would have to be a mechanism through which companies of a certain size (Google, Apple, etc.) are excluded from receiving free services from this organization. They would, however, be expected to support it with generous donations. If the large players in the tech would each donated ten million dollars a year (a rounding error in their revenue stream) to such an entity, the organization could easily raise hundreds of millions in no time at all.

vellum 14y ago
Good idea, but how would you determine who is a "patent troll"? Some of them are more obvious, like i2z. But 1-click is also a bullshit patent. Big companies like Amazon like to use patents both defensively and offensively. They're not going to contribute to the legal fund if it could be used against them. I think the idea is more workable if you start with recruiting small to mid-size companies + VCs. The big companies are more likely to join on a case by case basis, especially with someone else taking point.
- robomartin 14y ago
  The organization would have to put into place a process through which requests for help from members are evaluated. If the lawsuit in question is determined to fit the stated mission, purpose and standards of the organization they take over. There could also be staged levels of paid assistance whereby the organization might handle the case at a much-reduced cost when compared to going through other avenues. I don't have all the answers. Legal minds far more capable than mine would design a set of rules and options that would make this a true resource and, to use the term again, a "nuclear option" against trolls. I don't have a problem with the reasonable enforcement of legitimate patents, but the bullshit patents need a way to hurt those using them to troll in a major way. All you need is a few cases of trolls getting utterly destroyed in court for the environment to change completely.

astrodust 14y ago

Although I'm entirely opposed to patents, a way to limit the exposure of companies to patent trolls if if these trolls need to quantify their "damages" in terms of lost sales or lost opportunities. If they're not actively developing products, that is certainly going to be hard to prove.

karamazov 14y ago
This presents a problem for legitimate patents - researchers and others who develop technology would only be able to profit from it by bringing it to production themselves, rather than selling or licensing the technology to others and continuing to do research.
- JoshTriplett 14y ago
  Can you write any description that reliably distinguishes between a patent troll and anyone else who does not use the patent themselves in production (commonly called a "non-practicing entity" (NPE))? If not, that should tell you something. (Not that practicing entities can't resemble patent trolls too, as evidenced by the numerous ongoing smartphone lawsuits.)
  - karamazov 14y ago
    The issue with patent trolls isn't how they use patents - it's the patents that they use. There's nothing wrong with a researcher suing a factory over a patent the researcher holds that the factory is using without license. There's also nothing wrong with the researcher selling the patent to a lawyer, so as to avoid dealing with the legal system, and that lawyer then suing the factory. This works if the patent was issued for a meaningful advance. In fact, the researcher may not have been interested in doing the research (or at least in revealing his methodology) without patent protection. If the methodology were not revealed, other people would need to spend the time to develop their own process, when it would be easier for them to pay the researcher and then use his work. The issue with software patents is that the methodologies covered are trivial, and the time needed to develop your own method is trivial as well. Because the patents are granted for obvious solutions, many people end up violating the patent without ever having seen it; this is why patents are not supposed to be granted for obvious developments.

spez 14y ago

It's a stupid claim, and we're taking the most agressive action we can against it, which in this case means suing them first.

iamandrus 14y ago
I agree. "Displaying data in multiple computer windows" is an absolutely ridiculous patent. I know you guys can win this, best of luck! :)
- ceol 14y ago
  According to the article, the patent is for a method and system for synchronizing the presentation of data from different, but related, sources in different windows of a computer display It looks like this is person patented having multiple windows display related data in an organized fashion. Just as ridiculous, but differently so! And almost as vague.
- cperciva 14y ago
  "Displaying data in multiple computer windows" is an absolutely ridiculous patent. It would indeed be ridiculous if someone had a patent on displaying data in multiple computer windows, but that's not what was patented. Here's claim #1 -- the other claims are similar in their specificity: 1. A system for synchronizing the presentation of data on a digital computer display, comprising: first and second window-controlling means, each of said window-controlling means displaying information in at least one display window, a synchronization control means, and means for communications between said synchronization control means and each of said first and second window-controlling means; wherein said first window-controlling means displays first information from a first source, and said second window-controlling means displays second information from a second source; wherein said first information and said second information have sections, and at least one section of said second information corresponds to a section of said first information; wherein said first window-controlling means sends a message to said synchronization control means over said means for communications indicating a change in viewing position to a new section of said first information; wherein said synchronization control means sends a message to said second window-controlling means over said means for communications requesting a change in viewing position to a section of said second information corresponding to said new section of said first information; and wherein said second window-controlling means displays said corresponding section of said second information on at least one display window. Remember, patents cover methods, not purposes. This patent covers a specific method for displaying data in multiple windows, not the general concept of displaying data in multiple windows. Mind you, I still think it's a dumb patent. But let's make sure we understand what we're lynching them for before we get out the torches and pitchforks, ok?

phil 14y ago

This is a 1994 patent. Looks like it should be expiring in Nov. Better hurry up with that suit, patent troll!

dctoedt 14y ago
November 9 does in fact appear to be the expiration date, that is, 20 years after the first filing date [1, 2]. The patent owner can still sue for damages for pre-expiration infringement, going back six years (which is the statute of limitations). But damages for infringement won't continue to accrue after expiration. In addition, any injunction against infringement would expire automatically with the patent. [1] http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/search-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&RefSrch=yes&Query=PN/5345551 http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&Sec... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent_in_the_United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent_in_the_United_St...

mapster 14y ago

Trolls likely will settle out of court. I hope Hipmunk doesn't fall for this trap either.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

grellas 14y ago

A few thoughts: 1. The complaint here presents Hipmunk as the developer of an innovative travel search engine that offers something great that no one has ever offered and, hence, as a rising star in its market. It contrasts this with i2z Technology, LLC, - a Marshall, Texas shell entity run by a Silicon Valley lawyer - that invented nothing through its own efforts, that took an assignment of a soon-to-expire 1992 patent in July, 2011, that sued a score of mostly-large companies in the fall of 2011 for allegedly infringing that patent, and that made a letter demand on Hipmunk to take a license from it or be immediately sued. It notes, very pointedly, that the innovation done by Hipmunk from which so many people stand to benefit has no connection whatever with the patent upon which i2z threatens to sue. It further notes that, on the face of it, the primary claim of the patent in issue deals with two-window configurations not even used by Hipmunk. And it identifies prior art that Hipmunk claims invalidates the patent. Finally, the complaint states that this demand came to Hipmunk only after it had raised significant VC funding for the purpose of continuing to grow and to innovate and, rather than use these funds to pay for a worthless "license," it has instead elected to fight to expose this for the bogus claim that it is. 2. The themes of the complaint are almost a template for what is wrong with U.S. software patents at their worst. Patents are supposed to protect and encourage innovation. They are supposed to take things that would otherwise remain secret and get inventors to disclose this secret know-how so that it can be absorbed into an ever-broadening public pool of knowledge for society's benefit and, as a trade-off, give the inventor a limited monopoly barring all others from using the invention for a limited time even if those others developed it entirely independently of the efforts of the inventor. To get this monopoly protection, the innovation has to be truly inventive and not such that those skilled in the relevant art would see it as obvious in light of prior art; and it must be practical and useful as applied to real-world activities and cannot be so abstract and vague that it amounts to an idea, a law of nature, or a mere concept. To benefit society, the monopoly protection must extend to a point deemed reasonable for rewarding the inventor but not so long as to give him a windfall at the longer-term expense of others. All of these concepts applied beautifully to an industrial age where inventions tended to be tied to heavy machinery or to other innovation tied to long and expensive development cycles and where the resulting inventions were discrete and significant departures from the analog-style forms of prior art that preceded them. 3. Digital technology, when first deployed, tended to fit within the historical patterns but not so with software. When it comes to software development, development cycles have become extremely rapid. The ability, or even the inventor's desire, to keep innovation secret and undisclosed has severely contracted and, in a sense, much of what is innovative in software is an open book, with a whole universe of developers drawing from the same or similar sources and deriving very similar outcomes without reference to one another's work. Change comes quickly and incrementally and knowledge of that change rapidly becomes widespread. Often such changes, when reduced to practice, can only be described in vague ways that might be applied in all sorts of surprising ways to future incremental changes and, hence, the monopoly rights tied to such vagaries hang like a menacing cloud over anything that anybody might do in those areas. And even things that truly might be classified as inventive in light of prior art can be seen as being of very limited value in the broader swirl of rapid technological change within even a few years of the time they are given patent protection and hence giving every appearance of society's having given the inventor a 20-year windfall over what should instead have been incremental stuff worthy of 3-year protection at most. Now add to the mix an underfunded and besieged patent office whose examiners are not particularly qualified to make consistent, astute judgments about innovation involving software and who are effectively under quota-pressure to keep the patent grants moving along in the system - add further an enforcement system that imposes multi-million dollar costs upon those who seek to enforce their patents and also upon those who seek to defend against claims of infringement and that produces widely variable results tied to a jury system in which those passing the ultimate judgment can easily be confused and bamboozled in evaluating technical claims - add further that the appellate review level concerning patents has been placed in the hands of a specialized court having exceedingly close and sympathetic ties with the patent bar and with the idea of broad-based patent enforcement remedies (including potentially crippling injunctions) - add further that a specialized judicial district in a backwater Texas area routinely provides favorable treatment for patent claimants even when claims are weak or frivolous - add further that patent rights, being freely assignable, can be gathered in the hands of shell entities having no connection with any form of innovation but being intimately tied to a system whose purpose is to play the enforcement system to its maximum value in order to force parties to pay up or get swept into a litigation mess - yes, added all together, this becomes one lethal brew whose poisons now maim or kill, rather than encourage, the innovation that the patent system was designed to foster. 4. I am by no means hostile to IP rights generally. These can and do protect various forms of creative effort in ways that can benefit society. Still, IP rights when abused are the worst form of perverseness in a technologically-driven society and can and do damage society in serious ways. You wind up with those who have not innovated a day in their lives making debilitating demands on those engaged in brilliant innovation in furtherance of a cynical shake-down process that amounts to a toll on innovation with no offsetting benefits. The patent system has served the U.S. well for over 200 years. Its structure was put in place with the pace and methods of innovation fostered by the industrial revolution. That structure did not envision digital technology as embodied in software and has in the past 20 years become corrupted. It is time for a rethinking of what it takes in the patent area to encourage and protect software innovation. The current system, as exemplified in the Hipmunk case, is absurdly broken.

rhizome 14y ago

One can only hope that the previous licensees included a clawback-if-invalidated clause in their agreements.

sneak 14y ago

Did anyone else cringe at Hipmunk's use of the phrase "hard-earned venture capital"?

wpietri 14y ago

I can only hope that VCs are clubbing together to give patent trolls a good thrashing. Partly through lobbying; Congress should be sympathetic to innovation and job creation, especially during a downturn. And partly through a vigorous collective defense. Patent trolls turn their extorted money into more patents and more lawsuits. Like any parasite, the smart approach is to kill them early.

Fando 14y ago

i2z Technology = Loser

kn0thing 14y ago

Relevant: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/drew_curtis_how_i_beat_a_patent_troll.html http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/drew_curtis_how_i_beat_a_pa...