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by WalterBright 1884 days ago
> The Wright brothers were the original patent trolls

Edison was not only a patent troll, but was besieged by other patent trolls. He spent much of his career in court defending his patents and trying to overturn others.

1 comments

Do you even know what a patent troll is? Edison actually invented many items that he patented and defended against infringers (and he trod on a few others patents). Usually a patent troll has never registered a patent. He buys patent rights to any and all things he can get very cheaply, He then has all the claims assessed to see if there is a fragment that applies to any company that uses that technology - and writes a demand letter for infringement fees. They often ask for $10,000 to $25,000 and many companies who are faced with hiring lawyers and spending $500,000 in even a winning defence - choose to pay it. The trolls live on these fees. I could live well on one letter a month. The troll has low costs, a copy of Word on a computer abd a printer + postage and often send hundreds of letters a day. Read this.

https://www.techdirt.com/blog/?company=newegg

I used the term in the sense of the article I replied to said:

> They would file and stretch their patents to try and cover what others invented.

It's definitely what Edison did and what others tried to do to him. Nothing the Wrights did in regard to patents was new.