Apple Won't Have to Pay $309M After Judge Accuses Patent Troll of Abusing System to Fleece Tech Companies

Patent trolls are ruining the system for everyone.

Hopefully this judgement will make a large chunk of PMC's portfolio utterly worthless.

Sounds like the judge made the right call.

A great victory, but there will be more of these guys.

Put on your thinking cap... where do you think the "patent troll" acquired the patent?

Put on your basic math skills: They came up with these ideas and filed for patents in the late '80s. In the intent of the patent system, and any reasonable fair world, they would have 17 years to use or otherwise monetize their idea and profit from it, so until around 2005.

Instead, they intentionally delayed actually getting the patents until at least 2010, well over 17 years after they publicized the idea in the first place and only once the ideas were in widespread use. At no point between whenever they applied and when the patent was granted two decades later did they actually attempt to develop, market, or otherwise use these ideas for the benefit of society, or themselves. In fact, their entire strategy was to lie low and hope nobody even noticed, eventually developed the same thing independently, and it became widespread.

They did this with the express purpose of extending the patent profit window well past the 17-year limit. Worse, they abused how it worked to patent something that had been developed decades ago, re-developed since, and was already in common use and maybe had been for years. And then they didn't defend it, they waited even longer until a big target started using it so they had someone to cash in on.

They didn't create anything, they gamed the system.

As noted in the article, the USPTO actually closed this loophole 26 years ago, way back in 1995, because they realized it was stupid and open to abuse. But this company started the long con before then so got the con grandfathered in.

All of this is exacerbated by how vague the patent office will allow tech patents to be, so you can patent just about anything, and the only defense for society is that at least it can't extend past 17 years.

It's pretty much a guaranteed recipe for profit: Come up with some either vague or extremely specific tech ideas that aren't currently being used but seem like they might be some day. File for patents on them, then wait however long it takes for them to actually be used. Then wait some more until they're in use by a big, rich company. Finish the patent application process, and sue.

You never built anything, your idea has been public for decades, and you get a huge-money payout for doing nothing but applying for patents on a bunch of ideas that aren't yet usable and playing the waiting game.

NOT just a win for Apple, but for ALL Tech Companies that actually produce "something" !