In my last start-up a patent troll came and threatened to sue if we didn’t pay him licensing fees. It was alleged patent infringement of a business method (as most software patents are) and what he wanted to settle for was a fraction of the damages claimed (of course).

The recent Bilski patent case in the Supreme Court indicates a trend that wants “machine or transformation” in the guts of the patent claim. While patent trolls may be nervously biting their nails, the truth is, in the age of rapid software application development, competition from chop-shop code factories from Asia, and a slew of smart, domestic programmers that just don’t give a f* – waiting 5 years for a software patent to be issued is so 1998.