Stanford Professor Insists Consumers Are Helped By Patent Trolls

from the why-does-stanford-hire-these-people dept

Bloomberg has a weird story about Unwired Planet's patent trolling. As we've discussed, Unwired Planet is a company that's gone through many forms over the years, from Phone.com to Openwave and then Unwired Planet. It's true that the company was something of a pioneer in early WAP browsers, but WAP browsers were a joke that never caught on. The mobile internet didn't really catch on until the rise of smartphones and higher bandwidth wireless data connections -- which Unwired Planet had nothing to do with. So like many failed tech companies, it decided to go full on patent troll. A few years ago, we wrote about it buying more than 2,000 patents from Ericsson that it was then using to shake down companies that didn't fail in the same space that Unwired Planet did fail in.

The Bloomberg article is mostly unremarkable, other than calling the company the "inventor" of the mobile internet. That's misleading. It was one hyped up company that helped push a failed vision of a mobile internet, that eventually went nowhere. And now it's patent trolling. But the other bizarre part of the article is that it quotes Stanford professor Stephen Haber as claiming that consumers benefit from patent trolls:

“The losers from a world without patent litigation would, in the end, be consumers,” said Haber. Inventors won’t innovate unless they can ensure they are paid for their invention, he argued.

He may argue that, but he's wrong. Like, really wrong. Actual research shows that the leading reasons for innovating have absolutely nothing to do with patents. Rather, people and companies tend to innovate because (1) they need something themselves or (2) they see a need in the market. And the "ensure they are paid for their invention" makes no sense. If they have an invention people want, then they can sell that product and make money that way. You don't need patents for that. Yes, some others may enter the market as well, but that's called competition, and that's a good thing.

Amazingly, if you look at Stephen Haber's official bio, you'd think he'd know this. After all, it says:

Haber has spent his academic life investigating the political institutions and economic policies that delay innovation and improvements in living standards. Much of that work has focused on how regulatory and supervisory agencies are often used by incumbent firms to stifle competition, thereby curtailing economic opportunities and slowing technological progress.

Regulatory agencies used by incumbent firms to stifle competition is basically the definition of the patent system. Yet, instead, Haber has been spending the last few years preaching the wonders of patent trolling, insisting that lots of litigation is just fine and that there's no evidence that it's harming consumers. That's ridiculous. Tons of studies have shown the massive costs of patent trolling on innovation.

Having a Stanford professor spout such nonsense reflects incredibly poorly on Stanford.

Filed Under: innovation, mobile internet, patent trolling, patent trolls, patents, stephen haber
Companies: unwired planet