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Our journal has been closely following legislative efforts to take action against patent trolls. My colleague Tony Dutra has written about several of the bills circulating in Congress:

- S. 1013, introduced in May by Sen. John Cornyn III (R-Texas),

- The Saving High-Tech Innovators From Egregious Legal Disputes Act of 2013 (H.R. 845, the "Shield Act"), introduced  in February by Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.) and Rep. Jason E. Chaffetz (R-Utah),

- S. 866, introduced in May by Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.),

- The End of Anonymous Patents Act (H.R. 2024), introduced in May by Rep. Theodore E. Deutch (D-Fla.).

This last one—or at least its title—directly addresses an issue brought up in the latest episode of NPR's This American Life. The show did an hour on patents in July 2011, focusing particularly on Intellectual Ventures L.L.C., which was founded by Microsoft Corp.'s Nathan Myhrvold ostensibly to help companies defend against patent trolls.

This week's episode of the radio show follows up two years later with a story that, among other things, reveals a case in which Intellectual Ventures purported to sell a patent to a third company, but struck a deal in which Intellectual Ventures would still get 90 percent of the proceeds of any patent enforcement effort. So who is the real owner of the patent? The one with the paper title to it, or the one who actually would benefit from enforcing it?