Giant Patent Troll Intellectual Ventures Does 'Study' To Show How Much Everyone Loves Patents

from the a-lot-or-even-more? dept

Apparently Intellectual Ventures' attempts to improve its dismal reputation as the worlds largest, most obnoxious patent troll don't seem to involve finding a legitimate business to be in, or actually doing something to help the world, but rather to ask some execs some loaded questions to produce a study pretending that execs really love patents and think they're great for innovation. The thing is, the study also shows that the execs they asked are somewhat clueless about patents or how they're being abused today.

It's no surprise that if you ask someone who doesn't deal with patents regularly, or hasn't seen how trolls like Intellectual Ventures and their smaller brethren operate, it's no surprise that they would say that patents are a good thing and that they help innovation. That's the story that is constantly drilled into people's heads over and over again. It's only when you're actually dealing with the system that you realize how broken it is. Yet, IV seems thrilled to point out that their study asked the clueless execs, and those clueless execs said, for the most part, that they liked patents.

When asked, 75% of these executives say they are the primary decision makers regarding patents, yet only 24% consider themselves very informed on the topic. Less than half the executives we surveyed had heard of patent licensing companies (which were described in the blind survey as “a company that purchases patents and licenses them to companies who have existing products in the market”). Even fewer had heard of IP intermediaries (described in the blind survey as a “company that navigates/facilitates patent transactions within the IP market”). An average of 6.5% of the C-suite reported direct experience working with the IP industry in the past three years.

Yeah. See, next time why not ask them something a bit more accurate, like how they feel about "companies who go out and buy weak, broad patents on obvious things, and then use them to demand cash from companies actually competing in the market?" Or, rather than call them "patent licensing companies" call them by what everyone knows them as: patent trolls.

Then, I'd imagine the results would be a lot more accurate. The point, of course, is that this kind of survey is useless. Many people who don't use the patent system just assume that it must be a good thing. It's as they learn about the realities of the system that they grow so concerned. Also, it's a little unclear from the details mentioned whether or not the organization doing the study said upfront that Intellectual Ventures was sponsoring the study. Because, you know, if the local gang leader sent one of his thugs around to ask you how much you liked how the neighborhood was run, you might answer nicely to avoid getting beaten up.