[throwawaykf1]

Actually, small players like startups and independent developers are the least likely to get hit with patent problems. It's only because the few trolls that sued a lot of small guys got a huge amount of publicity that it seems like a big problem. These trolls are abusing the cost asymmetry of patent litigation, and something needs to be done about this, but they are still relatively rare. Unfortunately, this problem shows signs of growing fast.