Terry and the Pirates

UPDATE:

The bill, which has now been christened the "Targeting Rogue and Opaque Letters Act of 2014" (the "TROL" Act - get it?) has now been approved by the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade (say that five times fast).

The bill now moves to the full committee.  

On July 1, U.S. Rep. Lee Terry (R., Neb) introduced a draft bill  that would make sending bad-faith patent demand letters an unfair trade practice, with enforcement in the FTC.  If enacted, the bill would supersede the anti-trolling bills that have been enacted in several states so far. This is pretty clearly an effort to get out in front of the action that's bubbling up at the state level.

BUT...

The bill is still pretty clearly only half-baked.  For example, it doesn't address how the FTC is supposed to deal with concurrent patent litigation.  But it bears watching.