“Patent troll,” the term employed by leading newspapers, magazines and online publications to describe how some patents are owned and used, provides a prejudicial impression of patent licensing that unfairly influences attitudes towards disputes.
This is among the findings of the research conducted by Illinois Institute of Technology – Chicago-Kent College of Law Professor, Edward Lee. Writing in the Stanford Technology Law Review, Professor Lee says that while “some courts have even barred the use of the term [patent troll] altogether during patent trials on the ground that the term is unfairly prejudicial. But, among the mainstream media, the term is pervasive.”
Patent Trolls: Moral Panics, Motions in Limine, and Patent Reform, published on April 22, is the first empirical study of how the term patent trolls is treated in the media.
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