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pasttense01

The issues here are simply too complicated for juries to decide--particularly the amounts of money.

If Apple was simply using devices it purchased from Broadcom, Broadcom should be responsible for all the damages.

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> The issues here are simply too complicated for juries to decide--particularly the amounts of money.

That's why the appeals courts exist.

Pretty much any case requiring non-trivial evaluation of evidence is unsuited for a jury trial. Outsourcing the adjudication of justice to a dozen random people is stupidity on a par with deciding complex policy issues by popular referendum. There's a reason the non-Anglo-American developed world doesn't do it this way.

Worth mentioning that one (or both) side(s) will try to make the hurt be full of people who are stupid and easily swayed. That makes it even worse because whoever can throw the most buzzwords or be most confident will usually win in those cases. For examples, see the many jury cases regarding pop song writers “stealing” music

I wonder what a "jury of peers" would look like in these cases.

That actually refers to criminal cases, not civil.

There are tons of ways to avoid a jury panel. You find any sort of prior art and patents, along with any suits, simply vanish; you file a challenge with the patent office for reexamination, an expert there decides it's invalid, the case disappears.

You make it sound easy, but the patent office is severely overworked. Also, does the case just “go away?” Or do you have to file a motion to dismiss on the grounds that the patent is invalid?

That’s highly nontrivial. (And by the way, almost no one uses reexam anymore. It’s all about IPR these days.)

Which is why both sides bring in, and cross-examine experts to help the jury decide.

IMO you shouldn’t need experts; The jury should (in the first place) consist of people who understand the issue. Not people who are swayed by buzzwords.

If an industry is small enough, the only people who can understand an issue without expert testimony are people who are probably going to be highly biased, by virtue of working with one of the participants.

And regardless of the size of an industry, people who have a high understanding of an issue are likely to have preconceived biases about a dispute. Stuff a jury full of tech people, to resolve a tech issue, and odds are, an Anyone versus Oracle dispute is not going to have a fair trial, regardless of the merits of the case. Most tech people hate Oracle.

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