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Comment by arbuge | Hacker News Reader

Comparing patent trolls to bacteria would be an unforgivable and entirely unwarranted insult to bacteria everywhere. Even the plague bacterium deserves better.

We need to see alot more of this happening - hopefully this will show people there is another way to go, i.e. never ever settle with a patent troll, no matter how scary the alternative may seem to be. 3 patents invalidated but thousands to go. It is disgusting that these trolls managed to collect so much money before their garbage patents were ruled as such.

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You will never win by directing your anger at the people who are just responding to the incentives provided by the system.

They are willfully responding, and that makes all the difference in the world.

What does that even mean?

They are not robots, they make choices. If I offered money to steal babies, that's an incentive. If someone did it and tried to defend themselves by saying "I was just responding to the incentive" that does not make them any less reprehensible.

What I meant was to question whether responding to an incentive is ever not willful.

I was deliberately not talking about whether it was reprehensible. I was talking about how and whether you would succeed in inducing everyone to stop doing it.

Sadly, when people are offered money to steal babies they steal babies.[1] The moral outrage is important because it increases the cost of the action but removing the incentive is generally a more effective way to change behavior.

[1] http://www.economist.com/news/china/21570762-curb-widespread...

This is indeed true. What is needed for a long term solution is to fix incentives. In the sense that it shows patent trolls that there is at least some risk involved to their dirty game, the Newegg verdict does that a little bit. Real reform must come from (a) Washington and/or (b) multiple companies banding together into industry associations to fight the trolls.

The patent trolls have made tens of billions at this point - around $20B last year alone in fact. They have deep pockets and will not go away easily. It will take a real fight to change things, and it will require the support of many industry players.

Giving your anger a focal point can be productive, as it may inspire you to promote change.

Since IP lawsuits entered my field of awareness, starting with the Napster Trial, I've always wanted to set up a web site called "idancedonyourgrave.com" (or something with a similar sentiment). Morbid, but I want user-submitted pics of people actually dancing on the graves of people who have damaged our society through policy and abuse of the system.

My current candidates are: Lars Ulrich (Metallica, figurehead of the Napster lawsuit), Jack Valenti (former president of the MPAA -- hey, he's dead now, too!), Hillary Rosen (former president of the RIAA), and now I'll add Katherine Wolanyk (from the article, a co-founder of Soverain, patent troll).

I think you might be going a little far and taking this a little far... considering the black plague killed between 75 - 200 million people e.g. 30-60% of the population in europe...

I agree patients are bad, but let's not take things out of perspective ...

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Death

True, but it also brought about demographic changes that finally destroyed feudalism in Western Europe.

I wonder how many people have died because of inefficiencies caused by the patent system, or just the whole healthcare thing. I don't know if the medical patent landscape is a wasteland like the software one, but probably it's not the best we could do.

Just a thought: abolish the patent system. Pay the pharmaceutical research companies directly, by the State, like we do with military research or civil works. I prefer free markets but anything touched by patents is not a free market either.

The cost could be shared by the rich countries. Research is expensive but is a fixed cost. Manufacturing could be done by the free market, because all drugs would be generic. Rare diseases could be researched instead of just profitable ones. We would avoid all the "convincing" doctors to buy expensive patented drugs. Some companies would be specialized in research, others in manufacturing. Developing countries wouldn't have to be worried about patent fees they can't afford.

IP lawyers would lose, I guess.

The important difference is that patient trolls have some degree of sentience.

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