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It is awesome to see a company put their money where their mouth is, the good will with the dev community they are building with this will easily exceed the costs of fighting a troll in court.

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This builds up LOTS of good will with me. But still, I'm not sure you are right. The cost of fighting a troll in court can be shockingly large. If it were worth MORE in public relations than it cost in legal fees then it would obviously be an investment they should make, just to become more profitable. I doubt that... I think it is worth a lot in public relations, but less than the same amount of cash would buy in advertising. Nevertheless, it is worth it for two reasons: (1) because it scares patent trolls off of Rackspace in the future, and (2) because it's good for the world, even if it isn't profitable. Sometimes you just have to do things that aren't profitable.

I feel obliged to do business with Newegg and now Rackspace whenever I am looking for something they provide. Maybe their prices are higher than some other companies. If that's the cost of defending against patent trolls, well it's minuscule compared to the benefit.

Also Newegg and Rackspace are incredibly cheap so I haven't found anyone that beats their prices anyway. In fact, unless I miscalculated, after I switch from Amazon to Rackspace next week my monthly bill will be lower.

This is above and beyond the "do no evil" motto that Google pretends to uphold. This is actively fighting to improve society.

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