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Survey Results

By Troll Tracker

View my survey results here. For those of you who just want the summary, read on and don't click through. Note that I couldn't enable the results with the "other" entries revealed, because a few of you provided personal information, such as phone numbers. It would have been a violation of those people's privacy to enable everyone to see, and there was no way for me to delete any entries. So, instead, below are some typical responses for each of the questions which allowed an "other" answer.

The results will remain available for the next week or so, after which the link will be inactive.

1. Are you offended, in general, by the term "patent troll?"
12% of you are offended.
88% are not.

2. To which of the following categories should the term patent troll apply?
88% of you said it should apply to "Corporations whose sole purpose is to obtain and assert patents, with little or no connection to the inventors."
73% of you said it should apply to "Venture capital or other financial firms who are acquiring IP as an investment to be capitalized through enforcement (e.g., Altitude Capital Partners)"
64% of you said it should apply to "Contingency fee lawyers who go around putting bounties on bloggers' heads"
58% of you said it should apply to "Shell corporations set up by the patent inventor, who have filed numerous lawsuits against dozens of companies"
51% of you said it should apply to "Corporations that make products, but are acquiring and asserting patents with no relationship to their products, as a revenue-generating business model"
The other choices got less than majority support.
41 of you indicated "other." Here are some of the more interesting ones:

--> anyone (including, if the shoe fits, individual inventors and/or university entities) engaged primarily in naked patent licensing without any attendant technology transfer; anyone whose business is inventing patents rather than patenting inventions (though perhaps the latter should be labeled troll facilitators)

-->One key feature of a patent troll is the inability of the defendant to assert any patents against patent counterclaims. Corporations that make products take a risk by suing, regardless of the relationship between the asserted patents and their products. Trolls take no risk, and that's what dictates their style of litigating akin to class action securities lawyers.

-->Patent attorneys who write up paper patents with themselves listed as the inventor or co-inventor.

-->Local and state government hiding behind 14th amendment

-->There is no such thing

3. If I decide to stop using the term "patent troll," which of the following choices is the best substitute?
66% of you implore me to keep using the term.
17% of you like "non-practicing entity"
Only 6% of you liked "patent speculator"
21 of you indicated "other." Here are some of the more interesting ones:

-->Patent Shark (I got a lot of these)

-->"PLEC" - Patent Licensing / Enforcement Company

-->patent enforcer

-->Patent [insert derogatory term here]

-->dirty rotten patent sharks (with hat tip to Monty Python episode on names for Belgians)

4. How do you feel about the mix of serious content and humorous content on the blog?
88% of you said "just right."
10% of you said "too serious."
2% of you are no fun whatsoever.

5. If you have any suggestions on how to improve/enhance the blog, please let me know here.
I got 48 comments, with a wide range. Here are some of the more interesting ones:

-->I got quite a few "don't change a thing" - thanks...

-->1. Hold a limerick or "actual rhyme" poetry contest--that would be more fun than haiku. 2. Report more on the patent attorneys with the white hats who fight the big, bad trolls. 3. Solicit other attorneys over the Web to anonymously help you in various projects (e.g., compiling particular kinds of lawsuit statistics; researching and shedding light on the background of certain trolls) to save yourself time and increase effectiveness. 4. Provide an overview of the typical strategies of patent trolls both pre-lawsuit and after a lawsuit is filed. 5. Provide an overview of the typical order of events in a litigation in the various rocket docket jurisdictions (and explain how this differs from non-rocket dockets). [May be a good project to ask other litigators to contribute to, anonymously, one from each of the relevant jurisdictions.]

-->If you are getting too busy, consider accepting posts by guest commentators, sort of like this blog does: http://www.volokh.com/ (note - I'm considering it)

-->More JPEGs

-->add a forum for people to discuss the cases (note - anyone want to send me the "Dummies Guide" to adding a forum to your blog?)

-->I really enjoy reading your blog. I think you do a great job at uncovering a lot of shady lawsuits. However, sometimes I feel like you view anyone other than a large corporation as a patent troll. I know that you came up with metrics to classify level of troll (or non-troll) but the vibe is still there and I am glad that you have created this survey to (hopefully) remedy this problem. Individual inventors and bankrupt companies should be able to exercise their patent rights. They took a chance, disclosed their technology, and for one reason or another could not make it commercially successful. Those who are able to make the invention commercially successful should respect patent rights of others, as others should respect their patent rights.

-->Include nude pictures of the patent attornies involved. Seriously though - Check out Roughly Drafted. The writer uses some really nice graphics to make his points. (comment - no!!!)

-->Be more explicit in expressing the bases for your conclusions. You often assert premises to arguments that are assumed; if you are asserting a particular practice or tactic to be bad or unfair, explain why you think so, rather than simply saying that it is. For example, explain why it's such bad thing to sue multiple defendants if the claims asserted have merit.

-->I am offended by the constant mischaracterization of Acacia as a Patent Troll. Acacia has done an outstanding job of enforcing our patents as an exclusive licensee. We are a small company that could not afford to enforce the patents directly. As is the case of many of the patents that Acacia acts as exclusive licensee, ours are encompassed in our technology and actively marketed by our company. This hardly makes Acacia or our company a patent troll. Boo hoo for the big companies that would otherwise infringe our patents and would rather us be roadkill on their way to huge profits and market domination. I think you should get your facts staright before you start your mischaracterization campaign against Acacia or its clients. I find your vetting of the facts to be fairly accurate, however, this is poisoned by your bias. I do not accept that you would like to see inventors or small companies abridged from enforcing their patents to the benefit of large entities. Your blog is intelligent but this bias toward large entities is illogical.

6. Choose the answer below that best describes you:
16% of you chose "associate at law firm"
14% of you chose "in-house counsel"
14% of you chose "partner at law firm"
10% of you chose "small business owner"
8% of you chose "inventor"
About 5% of you are at a law school (clearly, Dennis Crouch isn't referring enough people to me)
About 3% of you are at the PTO/US Courts/other government

That's the people who answered. I got 25% "others," with some of the interesting answers as follows:

-->I totally forgot about "consultants" - there were a few of you.

-->Journalists

-->Retired

-->Computer Scientist

-->Quite a few people identified themselves as "open source advocates" and the like

7. Choose the answer below that you think best describes me:
29% of you think I'm an associate at a law firm.
21% of you think I'm a partner at a law firm.
13% of you think I'm an in-house counsel.
8% of you think I'm at a law school.
Only 1 of you thinks I'm an inventor.
37 of you chose "other," with some of the interesting answers as follows:

-->You are a patent attorney that specializes in defending large corporations that willfully infringe on the patents of small inventors. You started troll tracker as a vehicle to pollute the jury poll against your rivals and potential rivals :)

-->someone with courage and insight

-->I haven't a clue and I don't care. You perform a public service. Keep it up.

-->Bored

-->I like this question. It gives a good picture of your motivation. Ego!

8. Where do you live?
23% of you live on the East Coast of the U.S.
21% of you live on the West Coast of the U.S.
14% of you live in the Midwest
10% of you live in Texas
10% of you live in Europe
5% of you live in Asia

9. Where do you think I live?
26% of you think I live on the East Coast of the U.S.
23% of you think I live in Texas
18% of you think I work at the Niro Scavone law firm or live on Planet Niro
16% of you think I live on the West Coast of the U.S.
1 of you thinks I live in India!

10. What is your opinion on Global Patent Holdings' assertion of claim 17 of the reexamined '341 patent against anyone with a website with a JPEG image on it?
46% of you haven't reviewed the claim.
27% of you chose "the claim is invalid" (whether you reviewed the claim before choosing that, I have no idea)
12% don't care, because it's my problem, not yours. Hey, thanks.

Here's a bonus: the top 10 search terms used to reach my blog in the last week (not including troll tracker or something similar):
1. Wiav Solutions
2. Erich Spangenberg
3. Acacia
4. Mondis
5. Altitude Capital
6. Scott Harris
7. silly patents
8. contingency fee lawyers
9. Jerry Harthcock
10. Global Patent Holdings
53. "I need a good patent attorney for my ofdm wireless idea"
58. "Is there a law to stop patent infringement?"
87. "How to troll for fish"
98. "Reverse commode"
101. "When did Barack Obama work for White & Case?" (it was Sidley, wasn't it?)
130. "Your ip address be gone, troll."

Thanks for all the feedback, everybody! I do appreciate it. I may be "unmasked" soon, and I'm not sure if I'll keep the blog going after that, or I might transform it into more of a community/collaboration. But until then, other than some dark periods coming up where work will make blogging just completely prohibitive, I'll be back with more interesting news on patent litigation in general, and patent trolls, shell corporations, individual inventors, greedy corporations, "serial infringers" (as Patent Hawk and others call them), and everyone else.

Full post as published by Patent Troll Tracker on January 18, 2008 (boomark / email).