
Show HN: A crowdfunding platform to combat patent trolls - luisivan
https://unpatent.co
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luisivan
Hi Hacker News!

Patents were created to promote innovation, but as the whole industry agrees
now, they're actually hurting innovators. Patent trolls are using them to sue
the hell out of startups and innovators — more than $29bn/year are wasted on
patent trolls, not to mention the $21bn on VC investment also wasted on them.

We want to change this trend by empowering companies to invalidate patents
that threaten them and the whole ecosystem.

Everyone can create a campaign against a patent, and then interested companies
can back it. With the raised amount, we reward people for contributing prior
art — which is any evidence that a patent was not novel. Then we file a
reexamination before the patent office.

Patent office/lawyer fees + prior art rewards should be minimum $20k, which is
extremely small for anything regarding IP litigation. The process takes ~6
months.

We chose patent '435 because it affects the whole ecosystem - everyone
customizes online content with some user's preferences.

Let's kill stupid patents together! Feedback and personal experiences are
super welcome. Thanks!

~~~
voidingw
Awesome! Do you foresee corporations contributing to fundraising? Unpatent
seems like a great way to raise awareness of overreaching patents, but
individuals have little incentive to contribute financially. Corporations have
both the incentive and financial resources to contribute.

~~~
luisivan
Absolutely, we're 100% corporate focused right now. We also got some interest
from companies who want to fight against other companies' patents just so they
have a better portfolio than their competitors. That's not our utopian use of
the platform, but in the end, if patents that shouldn't be granted are
revoked, we're happy!

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zdrummond
Pretty neat that you have Lee Cheng as an advisor, who is hero in the battle
against trolls.

But from the Bio's, it doesn't look like anyone on the team is a lawyer. What
sort of track record do you have invalidating patents?

~~~
luisivan
Lee is awesome! We love having him onboard. We've been talking with lots of
lawyers since the very beginning, but to be honest we are automating the role
of the lawyer here. That's why we are focusing on the ex partes reexamination,
which allows this kind of automation to happen.

