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Microsoft turns to crowdsourcing service to swat away patent trolls
We've seen the havoc that patent trolls can wreak on tech companies and Microsoft clearly wants no part of it. That's why Ballmer & Co. have joined forces with Article One Partners -- a New York-based research firm that crowdsources scientific expertise to figure out whether or not patented ideas or inventions are as innovative as they claim, based on prior art. By subscribing to Article One's new Litigation Avoidance service, Redmond hopes "to reduce risk and reduce potential litigation cost" brought by nonpracticing entities (NPEs) -- companies that collect thousands of patents, in the hopes that one may lay a golden egg. No word on how much the service will actually cost, but we're guessing it'll be worth at least a few legal headaches. Full presser after the break. [Image courtesy of Robert MacNeill]
Article One asserts prior art on Worlds.com patent
Article One Partners, "a global community that rewards members for discovering patent validity evidence to legitimize US patents", has announced that they have turned up prior-art that may (or may not) be useful in overturning the Worlds.com US Patent 7,181,690. It's difficult to judge on its merits. Article One receives revenue by on-selling that information to interested parties. We're not sure how much for, but the prize paid for locating the information is US$50,000, so we're expecting that the cost of seeing the inforomation is considerably more than that.
