Week 5 - Post 1: Innovation Nation at War

Today I looked at an article in the New York Times about Richard Posner, a 7th circuit judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals.  He has taken it upon himself recently to begin seeing cases regarding any patent litigation, his logic being that he can throw out any lawsuits without a solid claim.  He believes that only for companies with products that are easily reproducible and highly differentiable should patents be allowed, such as drugs in the pharmaceutical industry.  However in the technology industry where new patents are flowing in every day, Posner believes patents are unnecessary and detrimental.  I do not know if I would go so far as to say all the patents are unnecessary  because not allowing patents in this sector would likely discourage some innovation.
        Posner also recently began stating in court that a patent claim case cannot go on unless the plaintiff can calculate precisely how much the infringing component is driving demand for the product.  Since many companies cannot precisely calculate this amount, such as Apple, many of the cases Posner has seen have been dropped.  While I agree this is a good tactic to prevent needless litigation, I wonder how Posner would create a universal precedent that would prevent patent trolling without causing harm to the companies with legitimate claims.  The line between legitimate and troll could become very blurry depending on the context.

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/09/opinion/nocera-innovation-nation-at-war.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&ref=patentandtrademarkoffice&adxnnlx=1362132161-7FJtYERw2XjJ/EX08FxcMQ