There needs to be an anti-patent-troll membership organization. You pay a fee relative to some metric and the organization acts as insurance against parent trolls by fully defending any patent lawsuits that are obviously unjustified. And to keep costs low, membership in this organization would be public to deter patent trolls from even trying to sue a member in the first place.
If I was carefully looking for prior art to invalidate the patent, I'd look at Verizon's patent portfolio:<p><a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hum_(system)" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hum_(system)</a><p>Their Hum product seems to do exactly what the patent troll claims to own a patent on. It plugs into the OBD2 port and calls emergency services after a collision.<p>Also, Nissan patented something very similar in 2004:<p>US Patent for Vehicle emergency notification system and related method Patent (Patent # 7,323,972)<p><a href="https://patents.justia.com/patent/7323972" rel="nofollow">https://patents.justia.com/patent/7323972</a>
In every western country - except the US and England - the loser pays for the cost of the trial (all parties' lawyer fees + the court).<p>Just this reduces frivolous lawsuits. If you have a good case, sure, go ahead. If your case is weak, you run a real risk paying not only for your lawyers but the other side as well.<p>(Note that there are disadvantages to loser-pays as well. Image you legitimately want to sue corporation X because they did something atrocious. Big corporation X can now run up lawyer cost that you have to pay if you lose.)<p>Edit: Sorry I was wrong about England (which leaves the US only).
Edit 2: In the US you can file for your lawyer fees to be returned, but that in itself is risk (I have some lawyer friends)
I've been on the receiving end of one of these (for my own invention, no less), helped bust another. Much good luck to George Hotz on this one. I can't stand patent trolls and even as an atheist I secretly hope there is a hell so they will get what's coming to them.
I always admired George, his simplicity and vision. But after this I respect him even more:<p><pre><code> What he didn’t take into account is that comma isn’t run by rational actors in suits sitting on a committee. It’s run by me, George Hotz. I’m willing to lose $1M before I give him $10k. We will hire an amazing legal team, fight this, and while doing so invalidate his patents so they can’t be used against anyone else. Not because it’s rational, but because it’s the right thing to do.
</code></pre>
This only can come from a strong character. Very rare these days where everybody calculates their angles even in matter of just cause or "right thing to do so" staff. Sometimes you need to get hit for good cause. You'll get stronger, but more importantly society as a whole will get stronger. Every win against patent trolls matters. Who knows how many great companies did they destroyed, which would make big change in our world. How many inventions delayed. Fuck them George.
I always thought Hotz an interesting character. This paragraph adds to that impression:<p><i>"What he didn’t take into account is that comma isn’t run by rational actors in suits sitting on a committee. It’s run by me, George Hotz. I’m willing to lose $1M before I give him $10k. We will hire an amazing legal team, fight this, and while doing so invalidate his patents so they can’t be used against anyone else. Not because it’s rational, but because it’s the right thing to do. No patent troll will ever get a dollar from comma."</i><p>I find that relatable.
I frankly don't understand why a judge or jury would ever find for a company which has no revenue, other than through litigation settlements. I mean if they're not even selling a license or royalties for their patents, any cases should be dismissed.<p>We can call it the "use it or lose it" rule for patents.
Comma linked a copy of the complaint in their blog post, but here's the docket for anyone interested in following the suit as it progresses: <a href="https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64914481/sucxess-llc-v-commaai-inc/" rel="nofollow">https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/64914481/sucxess-llc-v-...</a>
Any engineer who has ever filed a software patent soon realizes that the entire patent system in America (at least with respect to software) is a scam. It seems to be designed to enrich lawyers and tax engineers.<p>It's almost like all the kids in school who failed out of CS 101 went to law school and cooked up a scheme to tax their classmates who actually stuck it out and built something.<p>Why the hell do we have a system that gives a 20 year monopoly to assholes for shit they cook up on a cocktail napkin over lunch with their lawyer? This is how we used to brainstorm stuff to patent. It's utter bullshit. I refuse to participate in creating more bullshit patents.
This goes both ways, because patents are important. However, after talking to George many times as I watched his company grow with the SF proof of funzies in autonomous driving and DefCon pokes - the guy will not [quit] when he's squarely on the war path.<p>Get 'em, GH.
I suspect this is more common than one might think especially for smaller companies that have enough cash/revenue to be collectable but too small to afford litigation or to take a principled stance like comma.ai plans to do. Ten years ago my business was a pioneer in smartphone/flip-phone enabled home-automation. We had barely been in business for a few months and doing ~$4k in monthly sales. A troll claimed he owned patent that covered using a phone to send a command to <i>any</i> electronic device/appliance. He eventually stopped calling me and his patent was for landline based cordless phones but I kept wondering if he would resurface years later once I had momentum but he never did.<p>Oddly I am now fighting a trademark dispute with a company that claims "non-metal shelves and storage" in their trademark. What that has to do with my home-automation smartphone app, who knows. This is all a reminder that we live in the most litigious country in the world.
<a href="https://patents.google.com/patent/US20170170984" rel="nofollow">https://patents.google.com/patent/US20170170984</a><p>If you cut through the lawyer-speak, claim #1 is basically about MITM-ing the vehicle's internal message bus. Hardly novel, even in 2007.
This is so out of the Silicon Valley episode. I love it. God speed George. Down with patent trolls. I'll buy a comma AI just to support George. Even though I can't even use it. May be I'll gift it to someone.
"comma isn’t run by rational actors in suits sitting on a committee. It’s run by me, George Hotz. I’m willing to lose $1M before I give him $10k."<p>This stance is admirable but comma.ai is partly owned by investors. Isn't he obliged to find the lowest cost solution to this ? Or is George Hotz planning to spend his personal money on the lawsuit ?
In addition to taking on and crushing patent trolls, someone needs to also go after the USPTO for causing these people/companies financial hardship by granting these bogus patents in the first place.
In prior history Hotz was targeted by Sony for his independent research into running homebrew applications on the PS3 game-console. Unfortunately Sony objected to this and launched legal action[1] against Hotz and others which sadly ended in Hotz settling to not research Sony products again and did not set a good precedent towards such work.<p>Different situation but hopefully better outcome this time...<p>[1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Computer_Entertainment_America,_Inc._v._Hotz" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Computer_Entertainment_Am...</a>
Last time he got sued, George released this classic: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUvuaChDEg" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iUvuaChDEg</a>
> What he didn’t take into account is that comma isn’t run by rational actors in suits sitting on a committee. It’s run by me, George Hotz. I’m willing to lose $1M before I give him $10k.<p>Purely fyi, the game theory behind this:<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signaling_game" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signaling_game</a><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signaling_game#Reputation_game" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signaling_game#Reputation_game</a>
The most irritating thing about these suites, is often they know setting the IP lawyers on them costs more than the claims. However, if you have an extra $60k in tax deductions to burn, than enjoy the show with popcorn.
If you're a billionaire and if you're reading this, <i>please</i> start an anti-patent-troll venture and fund it as a philantropic project. No one else will.
> They subsist off of the settlements handed to them by companies who are scared and weak. This is just a straight up shake down, and I’m shocked that it’s allowed by the US court system.<p>I'm not shocked. I'm glad it is allowed by the US court system. The companies you are speaking of decided to settle by their own free will. You can have a litigant declared a vexatious litigant and barred from filing certain cases without going through a more stringent process. It is a shame that none of the companies has done that, but acting like the courts should protect businesses from being sued is ludicrous and would be easily abused by big corporations in their favor.
Seriously, at which point this starts affecting the choice founders make in which legal jurisdiction to base their startup?<p>Personally, despite many advantages I would avoid doing any new technology startup in US.
The patent system is filled with batshit insane patents that are ridiculously broad.<p>After I left Yahoo!, I was informed my name was put on two patents. Apparently I helped invent US8843560B2 "Social networking for mobile devices" and US10049381B2 "Mobile Monetization".<p>You all owe me money. Well, to Yahoo! actually, but whatever. Pay up.
Patents really do not seem like worthwhile things to enshrine in law these days... Companies like Tesla can release all their latents with no fear because duplicating a production line exactly is basically impossible. And the Chinese basically ignore foreign patents anyway.<p>They should just be abolished as a concept.
I was similarly attacked by a patent troll and was able to defeat them. My experience is chronicled here:<a href="https://joelx.com/how-to-beat-a-patent-troll-in-east-texas/12013/" rel="nofollow">https://joelx.com/how-to-beat-a-patent-troll-in-east-texas/1...</a><p>The fundamental problem here is not patent trolls... It is the patent system itself. We either need a constitutional amendment limiting patent time periods to 3 or 7 years or just simply dissolve the patent system itself. The free market needs to be truly free to actually function... Otherwise it's just a bunch of oligarchs using artificial monopolies to prevent competition and harm consumers.
I want a play by play dramatic court room drama depp heard style, i want the world to see what it looks like to set a patent troll on fire in real-time
What I don't understand with patent trolls is how this will even go a trial? How does this work?<p>There is a random lawsuit therefore you'll either have to pay or go to a trial? Who accepted the lawsuit in the first place and based on what legal ground?
This is the smart thing to do, on many levels, even if this can be risky and distracting, something that VCs would not be willing to back, in the long run he and his company have a lot to gain from this, both in experience and reputation.
> What he didn’t take into account is that comma isn’t run by rational actors in suits sitting on a committee. It’s run by me<p>I LOLed hard. I’ve sued an unethical company on principle before and spent more on fees than I got awarded in damages.
This is only morally outrageous because the very existence of patents is a dubious waste of resources to begin with.<p>The problems they are supposed to solve are much smaller then they bring about and better solved in other ways, anyway.
I have a dumb question about patent trolls.<p>How do they figure out whether stuff is truly infringing a patent in the first place? Surely some corporate espionage is required to figure this out?
To play devil's advocate, there is nothing about being a patent troll inherently illegal. Hotz feels the patent is invalid, but it might not be. Our system does not require you to ever build the object patented before extracting fees from it. This is in fact the way the US patent system works.<p>One of the patents is here: <a href="https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/patents/patent/10454707" rel="nofollow">https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/patents/patent/10454707</a><p>Method, Apparatus and System for Retrofitting a Vehicle. This does in fact describe what Comma does. Looks like it might be infringing!<p>Now Comma must prove this patent cannot be valid.