Everyone likes to read the ole tea leaves. The tilt of a judge's chin during an argument, the tenor of an unrelated oral order, the look in the eyes of a courtroom deputy—all are portents that might be interpreted by counsel attuned to their subtle frequencies.
But no omen is considered more decisive than the time it takes to decide the motion. Is a long time good? Bad? Salty? I got the real answers for you fam.
Take a look at this chart of motion to dismiss rulings by time pending (DE patent cases only, measured from the final brief):
If it's not obvious, the blue dots are at least partial wins on a motion to dismiss, while the orange are denials. If you can see a pattern here, you have my admiration.
But lets try it again for motions to stay (same caveats as before):
This one seems to have a bit more of a pattern, with an earlier decision looking generally less favorable. I would try and do a statistical analysis, but you would not believe how long it took me to make this hideous chart, so I am just eyeballing it.
As a side note, that denial all the way on the left is not an error, that is a motion that was denied the very next day.
So there you go, your motion to dismiss takes as long as it takes and you can't really draw any conclusions. If your motion to stay has pending for 6 months, on the other hand, you've probably won it.
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