[elwin]

The purported purpose of patents is to increase the amount of useful stuff produced by the economy. The purpose of patent trolling is the opposite: the product stops getting produced, and the amount of useful stuff decreases. That makes patent trolling more harmful to consumers than normal patent lawsuits.

[tzs]

Patent trolls generally seek royalties or one-time license fees, rather then seeking to stop production. Patent owners seeking to shut down production are generally patent owners who are trying to stop a competitor.

[cperciva]

It's not in the interest of Intellectual Ventures in the slightest to force people to stop infringing -- if people stop infringing, they get nothing.

If you're interested in maximizing the amount of useful stuff produced by the economy, having patents sold off to Intellectual Ventures is far better than having them continue to be owned by companies which want to do nothing other than shut down their competition.

[DougBTX]

Being the devil's advocate: if a company can invent a product and earn a profit through licensing a patent for that product, is it not likley that they could reinvest more in product development by out sourcing the collection of licensing fees to a company which specialises in collecting license fees, and finding new licensees? And is this fee collecting company not a patent troll?