My impression has always been that experts making predictions (in all kinds of areas) are almost invariably wrong. So I refrained from making any. But I've also noticed that a) a solid history of being wrong never stops any other pundits and b) it doesn't stop the public and the media from demanding predictions. Anything to firm up our shaky grasp on the future. So today, a prediction about the future of the NTP vs. Rim (Blackberry) dispute:

I predict that

it will now settle quickly, for less than the original offer of $450 million. Perhaps much less.

The second most likely scenario is that RIM will hold out, confident that NTP's position is only becoming weaker.

-Contrary to the assertion of NTP's attorney in this USAToday article, the Supreme Court's refusal to take the case does *not* mean that RIM should buckle under. The Court was extremely unlikely to take a case likely to be mooted by the Patent Office's pending final action on NTP's patents, and with issues presented as messily as in the Blackberry case.

-The patent office is likely to declare all of NTP's patents invalid in its final ruling. While NTP could appeal, this would take quite a while, plenty of time for RIM to finish working out a technical bypass. NTP's position is getting weaker and weaker.

This case has unfortunately drawn attention back to the problem of "trolls"--firms like NTP that own patents but do not produce the products and away from the *real* problem--if these patents are no good, how did they get by the patent office in the first place?

I emphasize, again... loser pays! Prior art! Perhaps, even, more arbitration!