"Too much gear for collaboration, social networking and communication tools is making people ruder, according to a new survey from some ginks working for a “social email provider” harmon.ie. The study found that during face-to-face meetings, 41 per cent of UK workers remain glued to their communication devices, sending instant messages, responding to texts, listening to voicemails or checking their emails. This figure rises to a staggering 70 percent during virtual meetings and webcasts.

"The worldwide web has made critics of us all. But with commenters able to hide behind a cloak of anonymity, the blog and chatroom have become forums for hatred and bile..."

This week, our colleague Joe Mullin, who writes the Patent Litigation Weekly for IP Law and Business, guides readers through a new PricewaterhouseCoopers study on patent litigation. What grabbed Mullins's attention was the significant role played by "non-practicing entities," the polite term for patent trolls. (Patent trolls are entities that bring or threaten litigation to enforce patent rights, without any intention of making or marketing the product at issue.) "Patent trolls aren't just surviving, they're thriving," Mullin observes.