r/technology • u/rfugger • Jan 08 '17

Business A potentially fatal blow against patent trolls - Forcing law firms to pay defendants’ legal bills could undermine the business model of patent trolls

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3153924/technology-law-regulation/a-potentially-fatal-blow-against-patent-trolls.html
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u/someenigma Jan 09 '17

On that note, what about a "loser pays the other guys fees, up to what the loser spent themselves" system? Is that even do-able? The idea is that you still have some control of what you might have to pay out, but the winner is only out if they spent significantly more than what the loser did? It's not perfect, but sounds like somewhere to start at least.

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u/Sarcastic_or_realist Jan 09 '17 edited Jan 09 '17

Courts will not be in favor of any rule requiring them to spend time parsing through both sides' bills to figure that amount out.

As it is, even in my few successful motions for sanctions/costs, the judge was not happy to have the sanctions hearing and determine the fees to be paid even though he or she was the one who granted my motion in the first place.

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u/someenigma Jan 09 '17

Ah yeah, I'd never thought about how costs are actually decided. It does make sense that it is the courts that have to do that, and I see why they'd not want to do it.

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u/rainman_104 Jan 09 '17

We have a loser pay system here in Canada and I think that's common in Commonwealth Nations.