Speaking of patent trolls, today Twitter announced that it will be handling invention assignments differently than most other companies. Usually, companies require their employees to assign inventions to the company without any restrictions or limits on what the company can do with any resulting patent. Twitter has agreed to limit its use of any patents to defensive purposes, to try to make the patents useless for any troll that later might acquire the patent and to try to improve the patent system. We'll see if this becomes a trend.
Ever since Intellectual Ventures entered wholeheartedly into the patent litigation wars, I completely disbelieve any company claiming that it is acquiring patents "for defensive purposes only." Although it's refreshing to see that Twitter -- unlike its social media counterpart Facebook -- has so far avoided getting bogged down in wasteful patent litigation, you have to wonder how long it will last.
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