Kickstarter.com seems to be on the verge of winning its well-publicized declaratory judgment suit against ArtistShare, the crowdfunding website that claims its patent covers Kickstarter’s social financing business model.

Kickstarter’s lawyers at Steptoe & Johnson filed suit against ArtistShare and its patent-holding unit Fan Funded LLC back in October 2011, seeking a ruling that their client doesn’t infringe Fan Funding’s crowdfunding IP. In a Feb. 8 letter to U.S. District Judge Paul Crotty in Manhattan, ArtistShare essentially threw in the towel — at least at the trial court level. Counsel for ArtistShare and Fan Funded acknowledged that, under a claim construction ruling that Crotty issued last month, there’s no way they can show that Kickstarter infringes.

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