[eganist]

> principled views about things.

Selfishly* principled. There's no exclusively abstract benefit here the way there is with e.g privacy rights; there's both the benefit of not having to pay royalties if they prevail as well as the second order benefit of deterring others from submitting patent litigation because other plaintiffs will know that Apple would rather burn cash reserves on litigation than on paying.

It's precisely for that reason that Apple should lose.