Patent Trolls Target Small East Texas Companies 281
An anonymous reader writes "In a sign that patent trolls are getting desperate to keep their cases in East Texas — long known as the friendliest venue for their claims — some have taken to suing tiny, no-name companies that are run by East Texas residents. The hope is that, if at least one defendant is located in East Texas, the judge will keep the entire case there. Nate Neel, a Longview, Texas resident with a small open source software company called CitiWare, was sued by Bedrock Computer Technologies in June despite (he claims) having no customers or other meaningful operations of any kind. In response, Mr. Neel has posted a strongly worded letter to Bedrock's attorneys on his Web site. It will be interesting to see how East Texas judges respond to this abuse of process perpetrated against their own residents."
Editorial suggestions (Score:1, Funny)
His letter looks like a refugee from Geocities, circa 1998. I say, go with that! Needs more animated GIFs.
Re:Texas (Score:2, Funny)
"Does anything come from TX that is good and decent?"
Tex-Mex food and Tejanos in general. This problem solves itself once all the white men are run out of Texas, which demographically will be in about 25 years. Eventually they will all be concentrated in Idaho, and we can nuke that from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
Re:Amazing patent (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Texas (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Interesting defense (Score:1, Funny)
That's a wiley thing to say
Re:Interesting defense (Score:5, Funny)
Maybe he's a coyote.
Re:Interesting defense (Score:3, Funny)
This guy doesn't need a defense, he just needs to reside in East Texas and he's part of this case no matter how ill placed the blame is.
You stay classy, Texas.
Re:Interesting defense (Score:5, Funny)
The Most Litigating Man in the World:
"I don't always sue people for patent violations, but when I do, I sue in East Texas. Stay classy my friends."
Re:Amazing patent (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Strongly worded letter? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Strongly worded letter? (Score:3, Funny)
Not to mention the lack of spell check.
Sew true, eye all ways ewes a spill chucker!
Re:Texas (Score:3, Funny)
If I owned Hell and Texas, I'd live in Hell and rent out Texas
Re:Interesting defense (Score:3, Funny)
Don't let reality get in the way of cool sounding stories or posts.
Re:Strongly worded letter? (Score:2, Funny)
In other words, a frequent usenet user.
Re:Strongly worded letter? (Score:5, Funny)
In other words, a frequent usenet user.
No, nothing nearly so respectable. I'm an attorney.
Re:Strongly worded letter? (Score:5, Funny)
The "E" is SLIENT (sic) DUDE (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Texas (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Interesting defense (Score:3, Funny)