Policy —

In foam-arrow patent fracas, Newegg swoops in to aid LARPer defendant

Newegg lawyer Lee Cheng: "We geeky types like to stick together."

One of Newegg's new t-shirts.
One of Newegg's new t-shirts.
Courtesy Jordan Gwyther

A church pastor caught up in a patent battle over foam arrows is about to get assistance from the nation's best-known slayer of patent trolls, Newegg top lawyer Lee Cheng.

Newegg will donate more than $10,000 it has made from selling anti-patent-troll T-shirts to Jordan Gwyther, who owns Larping.org, a hub for the live action role-play (LARP) community. Gwyther was sued last year by Global Archery. Global Archery founder John Jackson said he's ticked off that Gwyther has tried to sell foam arrows to the camps, churches, and resorts that make up the bulk of Jackson's customers.

The Global Archery lawsuit is an attempt "to drive a passionate entrepreneur out of business," Cheng said in an e-mail to Ars. "We were absolutely appalled by Global’s attempt to impose a gag order on Mr. Gwyther."

In addition, Newegg will sell three new anti-troll T-shirts for $19.99 each, and all proceeds are going to Gwyther. The black T-shirt features a "patent troll" cowering under a barrage of foam arrows. The slogan reads: "Troll Hunters—Fight Trolls Don't Feed Them."

Another T-shirt design identifies the wearer as a "Level 90 Troll Hunter," while the third declares, "We see you Trollin', we hatin'."

Cheng says that while Global Archery is an operating company, it still meets his criteria for being a patent troll.

"Global is asserting questionable IP rights aggressively and counting on the high cost of defensive litigation to win, so we consider it a troll," Cheng said. "Newegg hates trolls—they bully the weak, they hurt consumers, they hurt America, and they just suck."

Cheng continued:

We are also part of a creative and passionate community—our customers are technology enthusiasts often called geeky, and we geeky types like to stick together. Based on his actions and words, we do not consider Mr. Jackson a geek, and hereby designate Global Archery a Non-Geek Business Enterprise (NGBE). We mock them, and their legal positions. We declare that Newegg is a much better business than Global Archery—please sue us! Please file another gag order! Burn through that $150,000 war chest faster! Make your lawyers super happy—they have bills to pay too!

In an interview with Ars, Gwyther said he hadn't heard of Cheng before he posted in comments in an Ars Technica article. "I got like nine screenshots of that [comment] sent to me in a matter of minutes," he said.

"I'm overwhelmed with gratitude," said Gwyther. "It's been really great to have someone who knows his stuff to look at this from the outside."

Gwyther was sued last year and took the incident public last month when he made a video about his view that the foam-arrow lawsuit threatens the LARP community.

Meanwhile, the litigation moves forward in the Indiana federal court where Gwyther got sued. The two parties are presently battling over jurisdictional issues.

Update: In an email to Ars, Jackson said his company is dropping its patent claims after seeing more prior art. He added that Cheng's "patent troll" comments were out of line.

"Global Archery manufactures arrows and is a legitimate business," Jackson explained. "Further, this is the first time Global Archery has asserted its patents against anyone. As such, we believe that Mr. Cheng’s comments are unfounded and made without all of the facts."

Channel Ars Technica