Tech companies agree to bear patent trolls' startup costs

"Google, Verizon, HP, Cisco and some others" are getting together to buy up patents, apparently on the basis that if they buy up all the tech patents they can't get sued spuriously by patent trolls. Seriously guys, this is 101 stuff - you buy up patents to stop the trolls suing you and you'll end up paying the market rate, ie the expected value of those patents to the trolls as lawsuit ammunition. At best, this policy will massively lower the barrier for entry to anyone who wants to take up a patent trolling career, since currently to make money you actually have to get a decision in your favour, which is expensive.

(What might work is a one-off, unrepeated patent troll amnesty where the big tech companies get together to buy them out, like the dictator amnesty that's sometimes proposed. But no-one seems to be suggesting that.)