Ask HN: Anti Patent Troll Website

Patent trolling is a problem, especially for small startup companies. In general, most patent trolls rely on the inefficiency of the legal system to secure a settlement. They know that a small, or even a not so small, business, does not have a resources to mount a full scale patent defense, so they push for a settlement, regardless of the merits of the case. I propose to create a website that would allow people who find them selves in the unfortunate situation of being sued by a patent troll to find other people in identical situation and combine forces with such people. You would be able to register on the website and search by patent number, area of technology, patent holders name, law firm name, and some other criteria, for other people who are being sued for that particular patent. By finding other people in the same situation as yourself, in many cases you can simply join their lawsuit, or combine forces and file a declaratory action to invalidate the patent or have the court declare that a particular activity is not infringing on a particular patent. The site would also feature community prior art search tools, discussion boards, etc. The registration would be anonymous, of course. So, people would not be able to scrape the site and find out that your company has legal problem. Please give me your input, and please point out any problems you see with the idea. Also, let me know if you think this is something you or your company would use. Oh, the site would be free, though I have a few ideas on how to do small amount of monitization from this idea, though for the most part it would be just a service to the humanity. Oh, finally, if you like the idea, and what to help with it, please let me know. - Bogdan