Who’s Been Funding The Accused Troll?
Adrian J Cotterill, Editor-in-Chief
Word reached us back in November that Activelight, Inc. – f/k/a Activision TV, Inc., seemingly emerged from a brief litigation hiatus and had resumed its pursuit of patent infringement complaints against users and vendors of digital signage technology.
News in again over the last few days from Naples, FL where a local newspaper has been unearthing a number of less than edifying ‘racketeering’ stories on David Locke Gothard as ‘State sues Naples businessman, saying he bilked elderly people out of millions‘.
The accusations makes interesting reading and so to the court papers – not least, a list of who has paid said ‘troll’ over the last few years.
Note the large six figure payments from NEC Display Solutions, Adspace Networks, NanoNation, Four Winds Interactive, Adflow Networks, SoloHealth and others – ALL OF WHICH are effectively a war chest for the ‘troll’ and effectively funding to go get the rest of the industry…
$750,000 from NEC Display Solutions of America in 2011;
$400,000 from AdSpace Networks, Inc. in 2012;
$375,000 from NanoNation in 2014;
$340,000 from Four Winds Interactive in 2014;
$250,000 from AdFlow Networks in 2013;
$250,000 from SoloHealth Inc. in 2014;
$190,000 from Carmike Cinemas Inc. in 2014;
$120,000 from YesCo in 2014; and
$100,000 from Richardson Electronics in 2010;
$80,000 from Cinemark in 2014;
$75,000 from Tek Panel, Inc. in 2010;
$72,170 from Waste Management in 2013;
$25,000 from Nevada Property 1 in 2014
$24,375 from Tedeshi Food Shops, Inc. in 2013;
$20,000 from Drake Petroleum Company in 2014;
$15,000 from Cianbro in 2013;
$10,500 from Tri Star Energy LLC in 2014;
$9,000 from Colbea Enterprises in 2013;
There are a number of people above, we will spare their blushes, by NOT pointing them out here, who made BIG of the fact that they “never paid Gothard a dime” and “beat him in court” which was obviously a complete pack of lies.
The court papers state on page 47, that the Defendants did not reveal the amounts of the licensing agreements with third parties relating to the Patents but did list, we quote “according to one public source the Defendants have obtained over $3.1 million in settlements” – that list is shown above in value order (in the court papers it is listed in date order – earliest first).
December 27th, 2014 at 17:08 @755
Have you ever thought for a minute that these “pussies” pay your salary?
January 19th, 2015 at 15:40 @694
Do you know the “public source” for the settlement information in paragraph 144 of the Florida AG’s complaint against Activelight? I hadn’t seen these numbers before. Any insight would be appreciated.