A patent troll called Lumen View Technology got stopped in its tracks last year after it sued Santa Barbara-based startup FindTheBest, then asked the company for a quick $50,000 settlement. It lost its case, and has now said it won't even bother appealing.

Instead of settling to avoid a costly lawsuit, as several other small companies had, FindTheBest responded with a pledge to fight the patent all the way and also slapped Lumen View with a civil RICO lawsuit.

The counter-attack caused Lumen View's patent to be dismantled in short order, when the judge in the case ruled that it was nothing more than a computerized twist on an ancient idea. The patent delineated a process of having parties input preference data, and then an automated process of determining a good match. "Matchmakers have been doing this for millennia," wrote US District Judge Denise Cote in her order invalidating the patent.

Things got worse for Lumen View when its lawsuit became the first case in the country to apply new fee-shifting standards created this year by the Supreme Court. In May, Cote ruled that Lumen View would have to pay FindTheBest's costs, as punishment for seeking a "nuisance settlement" and then threatening "full-scale litigation" with "protracted discovery."

Lumen View originally appealed the order knocking out its patent, but it's now apparently seen the light. With courts frequently invalidating "do it on a computer" patents in the wake of this summer's Alice v. CLS Bank case, Lumen View probably realized its computer "matchmaking" patent had little chance of survival.

"The United States Supreme Court in Alice Corporation v. CLS Bank International has provided greater clarity on patentability in light of 35 U.S.C. §101," Lumen View's lawyer wrote in a September 12 motion indicating it would drop its appeal. "The parties respectfully make a request for dismissal as an efficient resolution of the instant appeal and to conserve judicial resources."

"They realized an appeal would be worthless," said FindTheBest director of operations Danny Seigle, who wasn't optimistic that his company would be able to recoup much in fees. "We imagine they siphoned off any remaining cash to investors, so they can declare bankruptcy and not pay the court-ordered legal fees."

While Judge Cote handed FindTheBest a win in the patent infringement case, she also threw out its civil RICO case. FindTheBest has appealed that result to the US Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit.

The battle over fees is ongoing. FindTheBest has requested about $149,000 in fees and costs.