Patent trolling isn’t just for the relevant these days according to the WSJ. Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who lost $8 billion in the cable industry and now owns the Seahawks and Trailblazers, is suing Apple (and everyone else) over some mundane patents. The Journal notes that Allen’s Vulcan Ventures conveniently isn’t suing anyone in the local Seatlle area. A second, among other things, allow readers of a news story to quickly locate stories related to a particular subject. Two others enable ads, stock quotes, news updates or video images to flash on a computer screen, peripherally to a user’s main activity. Patent litigation is on the rise with many high profile cases turning up huge settlements. NTP got $600 million from Blackberry last year, for instance. Allen is currently worth $13.5 billion and can usually be found floating around Puget Sound in some of the world’s costliest yachts (pictured above).
