Google Adopts Take No Prisoner Policy Against Patent Trolls

About 2 years ago, Google made a policy decision to stop settling law suits with patent trolls, including going after them for legal fees.

I think that we will see a lot more of this from companies with deep pockets, because paying people to make them go away has resulted in an explosion of law firms whose business model is to find dodgy undeveloped patents, and then use those to extract nuisance money.

It's a protection racket.

It's a good development, but the real solution is to change the law:

• Eliminate the patent court, because when you create a body that just handles patents, patents handle everything.
• Eliminate software, business plan, species, gene, and tax deduction patents (yes, you can patent a tax deduction).
• Note that genetic technology can and should remain patentable, it's the genes and the species that were not patentable until about a decade ago.
• Treat patents like civil rights laws, allow the person who is restricted by the to file suit against the holder of the patent.

Patents are not about property, they are about encouraging innovation,^* and our current regime is discouraging innovation.

^*The Copyright Clause of the Constitution, "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." (emphasis mine)