Name Richard Frenkel | ||
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Richard "Rick" G. Frenkel (born 1966 or 1967 ) was an in-house intellectual property counsel and director of intellectual property at Cisco Systems. He was once the anonymous author of the Patent Troll Tracker blog, focusing on the subject of "patent trolls" and "a must-read blog among top intellectual property litigators".
Contents
Dispute
In October 2007, Richard Frenkel made anonymous blog comments on a patent infringement case in which Cisco was the defendant. On the blog, he claimed that the plaintiff, a company named ESN, filed a law suit a day before the patent was issued (which if true meant the case had no legal standing), and that subsequently ESN's local counsel convinced a federal courthouse clerk to switch the date on the docket to the next day. At that time, a $15,000 bounty for his identity had also been offered by Chicago attorney Raymond Niro Sr.
Litigation claims
After Rick Frenkel revealed his identity on February 23, 2008, in the entry titled "Live by anonymity, die by anonymity", attorneys T. John Ward, Jr., the son of East Texas federal Judge T. John Ward, and Eric Albritton filed defamation actions against Cisco and Frenkel. "The attorneys [were] seeking damages for shame, embarrassment, humiliation, mental pain, and anguish. Further, the attorneys state[d] injuries to their "business reputation, good name, and standing in the community, and [would] be exposed to the hatred, contempt, and ridicule of the public in general as well as of his business associates, clients, friends, and relatives.""
Issues
The case raised questions about the risks of blogging anonymously, and received wide publicity in the blogosphere as it was thought that the lawsuits could result in precedents to be applied to future bloggers. Subsequently, Cisco updated its policy on employee blogging.
Trial
The Albritton case went to trial in Tyler, Texas on September 14, 2009. After Judge Richard A. Schell ruled that Albritton had to prove actual malice to be eligible for punitive damages, the litigation settled. The Ward case—which was filed against Cisco and not Frenkel—settled in January 2010.
Career change
Frenkel left Cisco in August 2008 to join the Palo Alto office of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati as a patent litigator. He was a partner with the firm. At the time he joined the firm, he said he was done with blogging.