Intellectual Ventures' Patents Starting To Show Up In Lawsuits

from the the-beast-awakens? dept

Intellectual Ventures, of course, is the Nathan Myhrvold company that has been building up a huge portfolio of patents with which to get big tech companies to pay many millions of dollars to not get sued -- and, according to many, to get a cut of future deals as well, making the whole thing sound suspiciously like a pyramid scheme. However, the company has been quite careful to avoid actually suing anyone (despite setting up all sorts of shell companies commonly used in such lawsuits). From what we've heard from people who have been in or around IV, this has been a conscious decision to avoid attracting too much ill will and scorn. It lets the company pretend to take the high road, when people point out that its actions seem like the commonly defined "patent troll" on steroids. "But we haven't sued anyone" it can claim. As if the threat of being sued isn't a big enough weapon.

But, a year ago, we noted that the company appeared to be getting antsy. While it was bringing in some hefty fees from a small group of companies who bought into the equity pyramid (which neatly lets the world outside be confused over what's "investment" and what's "revenue"), there was concern that investors were getting impatient. Pouring billions of dollars into a company that isn't doing much can make some investors a little anxious. And while we still don't know of any direct lawsuits, Zusha Elinson has noticed that Intellectual Ventures' former patents are starting to show up in court, often involving some of the most well known names normally associated with "patent trolling." Now, it's clear that IV sold the patent, but what's not clear is if it still has a financial interest in it. The thinking is that IV may have "sold" the patent, with part of the terms being that it gets a cut of any money obtained via that patent. This way, IV gets to have its cake and eat it too. It still can claim it doesn't sue anyone, but it brings in revenues from exactly those types of lawsuits.

As Joe Mullin notes in the last link above, this is one of the massive problems with the way patent infringement lawsuits work today. Via different shell companies, those who have an interest in a patent can be hidden to protect their "good name" while still allowing them to actively have companies sued via that patent.

Filed Under: lawsuits, nathan myhrvold, patent troll, patents, raymond niro
Companies: intellectual ventures

More Lawyers Want To Get The Troll Tracker In Court

from the shutting-up-a-valuable-voice dept

Last month, we noted that Rick Frenkel, who for months had been the anonymous "Troll Tracker," was being sued for defamation for some of the posts on his blog. Now, it appears that another set of patent attorneys that Frenkel wrote about are trying to get him into court. This concerned the rather infamous case of a patent attorney at a large law firm who got his own patents, and then used them to sue companies who were clients of his own firm for patent infringement. The lawyer in question, Scott Harris, is represented by Niro Scavone, who was another target of Frenkel and whose named partner not only proudly claims that the term "patent troll" was based on him, but also put out a bounty to anyone who could identify the Troll Tracker.

So why is Frenkel being dragged into the Harris case? Apparently Harris and his lawyers are trying to build a big conspiracy theory around Frenkel. Because Frenkel worked at Cisco, and Harris' former employer (Fish & Richardson) did work for Cisco, Frenkel's blog posts really were just a big plot to help out Fish & Richardson while devaluing Harris' patents. That sounds pretty far-fetched by any stretch of the imagination, and would require an awful lot of proof. But, what's most likely really happening is that the folks that Frenkel helped shed some light on are now taking advantage of the situation to drag him into court whenever and however possible.

This is quite tragic for a variety of reasons. No matter what one thinks of Frenkel's anonymity while working for Cisco, you cannot deny that he brought to light many of the shadier tactics being used by patent hoarding firms, often hiding behind shell corporation names and suing many companies at once. Since Frenkel stopped blogging, many of those stories are remaining underground. No one has stepped into the void, unfortunately, perhaps afraid that they, too, will become targets in various lawsuits. The information that Frenkel was bringing to light (while potentially biased by his position at Cisco) did help point a light at some questionable activities that had been hidden for far too long.

Filed Under: lawsuits, patents, raymond niro, rick frenkel, scott harris, troll tracker
Companies: cisco, fish & richardson

Patent Attorney Ups Bounty On Troll Tracker, Apparently Doesn't Like Anonymous Speech

from the thin-skinned-patent-attorneys dept

Last week we had the bizarre story of how a bigshot patent attorney, Raymond Niro, was so disturbed by the anonymous Patent Troll Tracker shining some light on Niro and some of Niro's clients, that he was offering a $5000 bounty to anyone who could identify the Tracker. Niro has now responded to some of the stories about the bounty, where he tries to "correct a few misconceptions" about the story. On one point, he is quite accurate -- the patent he's been accusing the Troll Tracker of infringing is not owned by Acacia, but by another firm, Global Patent Holdings. Of course, the Tracker had already corrected that story a few days ago, so Niro wasn't actually adding anything there. Also, Niro states that Global Patent Holdings "has no connection to Acacia" which is a bit misleading. It may not currently have any connection, but three years ago Acacia bought most of Global Patent Holdings' assets -- and it was even misreported by the NY Times that Acacia had bought the entire company. So, it was a pretty easy mistake to make -- especially since these patent hoarding firms use so many shell companies to hide their identities.

More importantly, Niro first raises the bounty to $10,000 for information identifying the Tracker, and then states that the Tracker needs to be exposed to be "held accountable for what he says." He also notes "if you really have anything truthful to say, you are not afraid of identifying yourself." You would think that Niro, as an intellectual property lawyer, would be well aware of both the historical importance of anonymity and the US courts repeated decisions pointing out that anonymity is part of our free speech rights. As for not "being afraid" to identify yourself, would Niro have said the same thing of the authors of The Federalist Papers? There's often a good reason to be anonymous -- which is why the courts protect it as free speech. Niro also insists that he's not trying to identify the Tracker in order to sue over the patent in question, but that would be much more believable if Niro hadn't used that same patent against another critic and also sent the Tracker an email telling him that he was infringing on that patent. As for the patent itself, Niro makes it clear that: "Anyone that operates a website runs the risk of infringing Global's patent if (as we believe) that patent covers the manner in which JPEG images are displayed on a website." There are some people who can make reasonable claims that they're trying to use the patent system to further the cause of innovation. But when someone claims that he can sue any website that has a JPEG image in it, you have to wonder how that could possibly "promote the progress of science and useful arts."

Filed Under: patent trolls, patents, raymond niro, troll tracker

Patent Attorney Offers $5k For Identity Of Anonymous Patent Troll Tracker

from the getting-under-people's-skin-apparently... dept

A few months back, we discovered the blog of an anonymous IP lawyer called The Patent Troll Tracker. It had great info, and you've probably noticed that we're now linking to stories from that site on a fairly regular basis. Sometime before we became aware of the site however, the Troll Tracker got into a little scuffle with a bigshot patent attorney, Raymond Niro of the law firm Niro, Scavone. The Mises Institute has a recap of the situation, but basically the Troll Tracker had mentioned Niro in a way that Niro felt was unflattering, and Niro asked the Troll Tracker to identify himself -- not, apparently, for a defamation charge, but for patent infringement. How could a blog post (unflattering or not) be considered patent infringement? Apparently, the patent in question, owned by Acacia (who, you may recall is considered the worst patent system offender by the EFF), can be interpreted to mean that posting a JPG image to your site is infringement. It also happens that Niro is the patent attorney who has filed some of Acacia's patent infringement lawsuits, including against the Green Bay Packers for violating this same patent. Apparently, Niro also used the same claim of patent infringement against well-known patent critic Gregory Aharonian. It's an interesting twist on patent infringement cases to use an incredibly broad patent that covers "posting a JPEG to a website" to basically go after anyone you don't like. Somehow, I doubt that's what the founders of the patent system had in mind. Hell, I'd guess that it's not what anyone who had any part in writing patent laws had in mind.

Of course, Niro has run into something of a problem in trying to sue the anonymous Troll Tracker. It's that anonymity bit. So, apparently, he's now put out a $5,000 bounty to anyone who can identify the Troll Tracker. Law.com has more details on this as well as some other odd moves by Niro. Who knows if he will actually sue (though, the earlier stories suggest it's not out of the realm of possibility), but it's stunning that a bigshot patent attorney would be so afraid of an anonymous critic of patent system misuse that he not only would threaten him with patent infringement claims on such an incredibly broad patent, but also is willing to put up $5,000 just to find out the guy's identity. Yes, this is what our patent system has been reduced to. Thomas Jefferson is rolling in his grave.

Filed Under: patent trolls, patents, raymond niro, troll tracker