Search The Way You Think

Take Action!!

2012-01-19T05:22:00.000-05:00

What would Thomas Jefferson say:

"I have sworn on the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."

Congress wants to control the Internet and commandeer websites. Please sign the petition to stop censorship of the internet and block our access to information and knowledge. Take Action Now!!

https://www.google.com/landing/takeaction/

Dick Tracy Would be Proud

2012-01-12T02:25:00.003-05:00

There is kind of a watch-technology thing going on here. One of the technology wizards we work with explained how he finds the people who are going to understand new technology. He starts every meeting by asking the assembled crowd, "Who's wearing a watch?" Once the watch wearing crowd identified itself, he sells to the other guys. I asked him why. The answer was, the watchless crowd uses their phone for everything. They have no preset notion on how things work, what things belong on what device and embrace the new.

After this week's Consumer Electronic's Show, the watchless are going to be faced with a dilemma. I'm Watch - the first Smart Watch. They may have to buy a watch.

Instead of using your phone for everything you can use your Android I'm Watch for just about everything. They may have solved one of the real problems with phones - leaving them places. With the Smart Watch you phone is on your wrist so you can't leave it in strange places and you won't have that other problem that no one likes to admit to, dropping the phone in the commode - no doubt one of the serious drivers in the sales of insurance on mobile phones. Made in Italy, this device may have finally matched the capabilities of Dick Tracy's radio watch.

The Verge has a more detailed review and more videos and pictures.

I think Dick Tracy would be proud.

Taking A Walk Around Business Methods

2012-01-05T04:23:00.000-05:00

Navigation, or Business?

By Michael Bowman

On January 4, 2012, I read two articles (here and here) about a patent (8,090,532) for “Pedestrian route production” issued to Microsoft on January 3, 2012. Both articles merely skimmed the surface of the patent. Neither of the articles, nor any of the comments at the time I read them, addressed the real IP issue related to this patent.

It is misclassified, and neither the inventors, primary or assistant examiners, or patent attorneys searched the appropriate prior art.

USPTO classified this invention as 340/990, with cross-reference classifications of 340/991 and 340/993. The original classification, which identifies the central inventive idea, covers electrical communications with a map display. The 340/991 cross reference adds the concept of position indication transmitted by the vehicle after receipt of information from a local station. The second cross reference adds position indication transmitted by a local station to a remote location. All three of these concepts fall under 340/988 for vehicle position indication, covering subject matter having the means to indicate the position or location of a vehicle.

As noted above, the patent title emphasizes that pedestrian routes are the inventive subject. The abstract states that “[a]s a pedestrian travels, various difficulties can be encountered, such as traveling through an unsafe neighborhood or being in an open area that is subject to harsh temperatures. A route can be developed for a person taking into account factors that specifically affect a pedestrian. Moreover, the route can alter as a situation of a user changes; for instance, if a user wants to add a stop along a route.” No mention of vehicles here.

On to claim 1. For discussion purposes, I give a letter designation for each of the claim’s clauses; these do not appear in the patent. Claim 1 states:

“a) Computer storage media having embodied thereon computer-useable instructions that, when executed, implement a system, the system comprising:

b) a search component that locates at least one information source, retains pedestrian history from a plurality of pedestrians and addresses of at least one information source that has a history of providing reliable information, identifies low quality information sources that do not provide information used in route generation, and blocks information obtainment for the low quality information sources;

c) a gather component that obtains information related to pedestrian travel including security information, weather information, and terrain information, wherein the gather component obtains the information from the at least one located information source;

d) an artificial intelligence component that makes at least one inference regarding a route based on a previous pedestrian behavior;

e) a filter component that determines, based on the at least one inference, the information that is likely relevant and deletes information that is commonly of little value in part through examination of previously produced routes;

f) an analysis component that determines an importance of the information to a user, estimates how likely the information is to change, and chooses if the user should reach a destination through a pedestrian route and/or through a conventional route;

g) a generation component that obtains the information from the gather component and produces a direction set for use by a pedestrian based at least part upon the obtained information;

h) and a resolution component that resolves a conflict between an information source with a financial interest and an information source without a financial interest and instructs the generation component to produce the direction set based upon the information source that does not have a financial interest in providing the direction set.”

Clause a) specifies software — “Computer storage media having embodied thereon computer-useable instructions that, when executed . . .”

Clause b) discusses pedestrians as the moving objects.

Clause c) discusses pedestrian travel and adds detail that information on security, weather, and terrain is collected by the software.

Clause d) adds an artificial intelligence (only a nominal recitation, though) component to the analysis of previous pedestrian route behavior.

Clause e) adds a filter.

Clause f) adds an “analysis component that determines an importance of the information to a user, estimates how likely the information is to change, and chooses if the user should reach a destination through a pedestrian route and/or through a conventional route.”

Clause g) generates a route.

Clause h) resolves conflicts between information sources used to generate routes with and without financial interests in favor of those without.

Several key observations may be made on claim 1:

The claim is solely directed toward pedestrians.
Clause c), by adding security information, should have a cross reference classification of 705/325 for personal security, identity, or safety.
It includes (clause f) an operations research or analysis component (705/7.11-7.42).
It includes a market analysis component (clause h).
Claim 1 should have been classified as 705/7.29 (market data gathering, market analysis or market modeling) according to USPTO’s rules of classification.
Class 340 does not apply here. Further, none of the three classifications listed on the patent can be applied as they all require a vehicle. The original (first-listed) classification must be based on the claimed disclosure.
This is a business methods claim.

Claims 2-6 are dependents of claim 1. Therefore, again according to USPTO’s own classification rules, they add additional detail to claim 1, and in most cases do not direct the claim to a different classification. Other inventive concepts disclosed in these claims may require or allow additional cross reference classifications.

Claims 2 and 3 emphasize the pedestrian as the moving object, and don’t provide any additional classifiable detail.

Claim 4, a dependent of 3, adds metadata, but no new detail.

Claim 5 “performs a reward operation in relation to information obtainment or direction set production, wherein the reward operation rewards the pedestrian, an advertisement hosting service, a provider, or any combination thereof.” This falls within the 705/14.1 array of the class 705 schedule, for discount or incentive (e.g., coupon, rebate, offer, upsale, etc.). It would fall specifically within 705/14.39 for online discount or incentive, and should be listed as a cross reference classification.

Claim 6 adds an advertisement, specifically a targeted advertisement, which is 705/14.49, another cross reference.

Claims 7-12 are methods claims. Claim 7 essentially converts the systems claims 1-6 into a method, and should retain the 705/7.29 classification.

Claims 13-15 are dependents of claim 1. Claim 13 adds detail on routes of other people. Claim 14 indicates that the user may travel a portion of the route as a passenger, and claim 15 indicates that the user travels on public transportation. These two claims, however, do not add sufficient detail to claim 1 to require a classification in class 340.

The patent lists the fields of search as 701/200,201,208,211,213 340/991,993,990,995 364/443,444,449. Class 701 is data processing for vehicles, navigation, and relative location. Class 364 has been abolished. Class 705 was not searched.

Bottom line, this patent is a business method, is completely misclassified, was not searched against the proper prior art, had a five-year prosecution history, and no one involved got it right.

Fantasy Football Insurance

2012-01-05T04:00:00.000-05:00

Tom Bakos who publishes the Insurance IP Bulletin and follows activity in US patent class 705/4 where the insurance business methods patents can be found, passed along the latest Fantasy Sports patent application - Fantasy Sports Insurance.

I've been watching the Fantasy Sports IP space for a while. The seminal Fantasy Sports patent is "Computerized Statistical Football Game" taught in US Patent 4,918,603. I wrote a post on the Fantasy Football patents back in 2010 on the patent and some of the inventors follow on work. There are lots of interesting angles when you look at the evolution of fantasy sports leagues IP. The inventors are local guys. The original patent was filed in 1988 and was one of those patents that a lot of people didn't think covered a patentable subject matter. Then there were the guys who just decided to infringe the patent. And then there are the inventions that followed. The patent application Tom passed along is the latest entry in the continuum.

The new application, published on December 22 is for "A method of providing insurance to a fantasy sports participant includes receiving a request from the participant for an insurance policy covering an insured risk for an insured amount and providing an insurance policy to the participant covering the insured risk for the insured amount, in exchange for a premium. The participant owns a fantasy team and is in a fantasy league. The insured risk is at least one player on the fantasy team not playing for at least a portion of a fantasy season of the fantasy league. An amount of the premium is dependent on underwriting of the insured risk and the insured amount."

The majority of claims seem to be missing the standard business methods mumbo jumbo. It shows up in claim 25.

Here are Claims 1-4:

1. A method of providing insurance to a fantasy sports participant, comprises: receiving a request from the participant for an insurance policy covering an insured risk for an insured amount; and providing an insurance policy to the participant covering the insured risk for the insured amount, in exchange for a premium; wherein the participant owns a fantasy team, and is in a fantasy league, the insured risk is at least one player on the fantasy team not playing for at least a portion of a fantasy season of the fantasy league, and an amount of the premium is dependent on underwriting of the insured risk and the insured amount.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the fantasy league has a corresponding real sports league.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the real sports league is a professional sports league.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the sport of the real sports league is selected from the group consisting of football, baseball, basketball and hockey.

Here's Claim 25:

25. A computer program product comprising software encoded in computer-readable media, for providing insurance to a fantasy sports participant, the software comprising instructions, operable when executed, to: receive a request from the participant for an insurance policy covering an insured risk for an insured amount; and provide an insurance policy to the participant covering the insured risk for the insured amount, in exchange for a premium; wherein the participant owns a fantasy team, and is in a fantasy league, the insured risk is at least one player on the fantasy team not playing for at least a portion of a fantasy season of the fantasy league, and an amount of the premium is dependent on underwriting of the insured risk and the insured amount.

(Looks like the a patent attorney or the examiner provided guidance here...)

The patent application is an interesting read. It will be interesting to see what happens to it as it moves along the patent prosecution continuum.

Thanks again to Tom for passing it along.

Twelve Year Old Science & Eight Year Old Patents

2011-12-28T04:30:00.000-05:00

There is a meme in the patent world that says, "patent trolls stifle innovation." Just listen to the drum beat of the digital dialog on the subject and you'll hear the patent cognoscenti bemoaning the evils of the NPE. The message is spreading across the patentsphere and is fast becoming urban legend. Trolls hurt innovation so they hurt the economy.

James Bessen, Jennifer Ford, and Michael J. Meurer of Boston University School of Law published a paper titled, “The Private and Social Costs of Patent Trolls” on the topic of patent trolls in November 2011. The authors state, “NPE lawsuits are associated with half a trillion dollars of lost wealth to defendants from 1990 through 2010. During the last four years the lost wealth has averaged over $80 billion per year."

This piece of information has made its way around the Internet landing at many serious business publications like the Wall Street Journal and lots of influential tech blogs including many that have just recently learned how to spell patent.

"The Private and Social Costs of Patent Trolls" is a good paper with lots of compelling discussion on the negative impact of patent litigation brought by non-practicing entities. The financial arguments are sound, the numbers are good and supportable. Mr. Bessen presented his paper at the USPTO Patent Statistics conference in November, and he makes a very compelling case about the economic and social impact of NPE lawsuits and their impact on the organizations defending themselves against them. (I refuse to use the victim term here. You'll see why below.)

There is another important fact buried in the paper. It states:

"The mean NPE law suit occurs eight years after the patent is granted."

Consider what this means. The average patent's pendency runs around 36 months. (It was slightly lower in the timeframe of the author's study but let's use 36 months for illustrative purposes.) There are plenty of patents in NPE litigation that were based on provisional applications so add another 12 months. Twelve years works either way - with or without a provisional when you consider how prior art is looked at. We are up to around four years of application pendency before the patent is granted. Now add eight years before one of the evil trolls takes action. So we now have a patent based on 12 year old science and technology. So, when an NPE litigates, the inventions are 12 years old. More than half way through their patent term.

NPEs are litigating patents with 12 year old technology.

The patent has been in the public domain for eight years before the NPE files suit. Eight years. Eight years that it's been on every free patent searching tool, eight years it's been in the tools for the patent cognoscenti, eight years that the patent examiners have had it as a source of prior art and as a consideration on the novelty of new patents that follow it.

NPEs enforce patents that has been in the public domain for eight years.

If the inventor decided to file a PCT, the patent application was published internationally, and if it was after 2001, domestically in the US. It may also have been translated into other languages - usually one of the trilateral languages - French, German, Japanese - but there are some in Korean and other languages. The patents litigated by NPEs have been out there in other languages.

Multiple versions of these patents for the invention have been disclosed for the granted patent used by the patent troll to litigate eight years after the patent grant date.

What do we learn from this?

Patent troll is really a pejorative term for guys who really know how to dig through the vast store of patent dreck to find valuable patents. (Investors in non-correlated assets take note.)

Patent trolls watch the market and find patents that are enforceable and that were largely ignored by their product producing business counterpart, the practicing entity because they have been making products covered by the patents. (Note to self, do freedom to operate search before finalizing the product.)

When the big voices of science and technology and their proxies start whining about how patent trolls are stifling innovation, what they are really saying is patent trolls do better research and have better tactics for finding valuable patents where the practicing entity has either decided not to get a license before building products or have decided to not to look at all.

How are patent trolls stifling innovation when they are dealing with 12 year old technology that has been public for around 8 years?

Please advise.

USPTO Algoritm Challenge

2011-12-26T04:00:00.000-05:00

The USPTO Innovation Challenge is off and running. The world's leading intellectual property office has issued a challenge for top coders to solve one of their big examiner challenges - matching the drawings that are part of a patent application with the text within the body of the patent's specification so that they can be displayed an analyzed side by side (or some other preferred embodiment thereof.) This helps the examiner review the patent application in light of the drawings and vice versa.

Aside from the strange set of rules about who can play - among them that coders work in teams of two and may be assigned to work together rather than letting teams of folks who know each other (or know patents) work together, the contest has some very strange rules with respect to intellectual property.

This group of coders is being encouraged to build a new algorithm. Did USPTO chose the term algorithm to try to get around patentability issues by letting them claim that this is an algorithm not subject to patentability? Have they decided to enter into the software patent conundrum? Did they do any of that pesky freedom to operate stuff when they created their contest?

"The Contest is designed to encourage the development of software (“Algorithm”) that solves the stated computational problem, and also to study the effectiveness of teams in solving algorithmic problems. In this contest all participants will compete in teams of two working together over the course of one month to develop their solutions and deliver an algorithm that can automatically identify and locate specific elements within patent documents drawings pages. Code submissions will automatically be scored based on their accuracy in solving the problem based on manually labeled test data. This experimental contest format is part of TopCoder’s ongoing partnership with the Harvard-NASA Tournament lab to better understand how tournaments contests can be used to solve complex computational problems."

But when USPTO and/or the winner of the challenge try to actually implement the software on a computer with non-transitory storage where there is definitely going to be a transformation between the submitted drawings and the new presentation they will be in the infringement ball park big time.

A cursory look at patents in this area resulted in a starter list of over 16,000 enforceable patents that deal with image extraction, content interpretation, compression/decompression, text matching, entity relationship matching, etc. (By the way we are experts in digital imaging, database, text processing, OCR, entity extraction and the image based workflow software arena and have done plenty of work with patents in this domain - so we know where to look for this stuff.) Did they consider the potential for infringement on the part of the unsuspecting coders? Did they even both to look at US patents to see if the technology to do this exists? (It does.)

This ought to be very interesting. I'm sure some of the top patent assertion entities will be standing by to assist the inventors and patent holders whose patents are being infringed in getting a swift resolution to the matter.

Refresher...

As a refresher, let us consider the rules in the Manual of Patent Examination Procedures regarding patent infringement. Clearly USPTO understands infringement of a patent.But for those of you who need a refresher, here you go.

5 U.S.C. 271 Infringement of patent.

(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title, whoever without authority makes, uses, offers to sell, or sells any patented invention, within the United States, or imports into the United States any patented invention during the term of the patent therefor, infringes the patent.

(b) Whoever actively induces infringement of a patent shall be liable as an infringer.

(c) Whoever offers to sell or sells within the United States or imports into the United States a component of a patented machine, manufacture, combination, or composition, or a material or apparatus for use in practicing a patented process, constituting a material part of the invention, knowing the same to be especially made or especially adapted for use in an infringement of such patent, and not a staple article or commodity of commerce suitable for substantial noninfringing use, shall be liable as a contributory infringer.

(d) No patent owner otherwise entitled to relief for infringement or contributory infringement of a patent shall be denied relief or deemed guilty of misuse or illegal extension of the patent right by reason of his having done one or more of the following: (1) derived revenue from acts which if performed by another without his consent would constitute contributory infringement of the patent; (2) licensed or authorized another to perform acts which if performed without his consent would constitute contributory infringement of the patent; (3) sought to enforce his patent rights against infringement or contributory infringement; (4) refused to license or use any rights to the patent; or (5) conditioned the license of any rights to the patent or the sale of the patented product on the acquisition of a license to rights in another patent or purchase of a separate product, unless, in view of the circumstances, the patent owner has market power in the relevant market for the patent or patented product on which the license or sale is conditioned.

Merry Christmas Redux

2011-12-25T00:30:00.000-05:00

In the spirit of the season we send holiday greetings to all of our friends and colleagues. The prosecution of last year's claim continues. Feel free to infringe.

Holiday Greetings from Frosty the Article Holding Figurine.

We claim a method of communicating holiday greetings comprising a representational snowman like figure offered in combination with a social expression communication associated with an occasion, holiday, or event; delivered via a communication network wherein the communication network comprises a computer connected to a telecommunications device that facilitates exchange of greetings via the Internet through posts on a weblog, a weblog being a web-based journal that contains periodic posts usually in reverse chronological order.

Frosty the Article Holding Figurine with his preferred embodiment article, the jacket, casually thrown over his shoulder and the inscrutable yet determined look on the upper orbital section of the facial structure is no ordinary a snowman shaped object, he is a figurine of action. He strikes a dashing pose with his top hat-like structure affixed to the upper portion of the preferred embodiment snowman-like shape. The representational human visage let's us know this article holding figurine is no victim of the politically correct as represented by the corn-cob pipe like smoking apparatus clinched in dual elliptical indents designed to represent a notional mouth. In the preferred embodiment he is on the way to a festive holiday gathering to join his other patented figurine, ornamental, and decorative cohorts including the snowman shaped Christmas tree, in celebration of the holiday season.

In the preferred embodiment, all of us at Coronado Group wish you a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year, and a bright and shiny holiday season.

Christmas Quotes No. 12 - The End!!

2011-12-24T05:00:00.000-05:00

On Trade Secrets:

"It doesn’t count as a trade secret if it’s left out in the open. The law would say one cannot put the burden on someone who happens on the information inadvertently ... You can’t sue someone for overhearing what you say in a crowded elevator."

Susan J. Kohlmann, Partner at Jenner & Block LLP, NYTimes October 23, 2011.

On Innovation - Quote No. 11

2011-12-23T04:30:00.000-05:00

"Innovation--the essence of innovation--is you don't know what you're going to build, what it's going to be called, how much it's going to cost."

Michael Bloomberg, August 2011, Fast Company Magazine

On Innovation - Quote No. 10

2011-12-22T05:00:00.000-05:00

"If I listened to my customers I would have invented a faster horse."

Henry Ford

Christmas Quotes No. 9

2011-12-21T04:30:00.000-05:00

"Knowledge processes information to produce ideas, analysis, and skills that ideally should contribute to human progress and civilization."

Ahmed Abdel Latif

Quote No. 8

2011-12-20T04:00:00.000-05:00

“Those who take the informational turn see information as the basic ingredient in building a mind.”

Frederick Adams

On Information - Quote No. 7

2011-12-19T05:00:00.000-05:00

“As commonly used, …information is a very elastic term. It is the stuff of communication.”

From Information is a Very Elastic Term, by R.V. L. Hartley, Transmission of Information, Bell Systems Technical Journal, July 1928.

Christmas Quotes No. 6

2011-12-18T07:57:00.000-05:00

"...The past is never the future. But it’s easy to get caught up in the continuum."

Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com on innovation. August 8, 2011 Forbes

The Quotes Continue - No. 5

2011-12-17T05:00:00.000-05:00

.... the scientists complained of “what seems to us a rather chaotic growth in technical vocabulary.”

In a Letter to Nature, Spring 1953 as quoted by James Gleick in The Information

Quotes for Christmas No. 4

2011-12-16T05:00:00.000-05:00

"In 1910 a Danish botanist, Wilhelm Johannsen, self-consciously invented the word gene. He was at pains to correct the common mythology and thought a word might help."

By James Gleick, The Information.

As of today a search on the word "gene" in Google Patents yields 40,700 results. It looks like the word stuck. I'm sure there will be more later on Tuesday.

My Quotes for Christmas No.3

2011-12-15T05:00:00.000-05:00

Thomas Edison Patent
398774 - 1883

"Meme - a unit of cultural inheritance ideas evolve like genes do and their success is based on their ability to spread not on the benefit they provide their host."

By Richard Dawkins, The Selfish-Gene 1976

I generally hate the light bulb metaphor for good ideas but I'll use it just this once because this image comes from the originator not from an art director.

Quotes of Christmas Round 2

2011-12-14T07:35:00.000-05:00

"My view is that people are creative animals and will figure out cleaver ways to use tools that the inventor never imagined."

Steve Jobs as quoted in Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson.

Who knows what will come about when you give an innovative object to an innovative human.

Twelve Quotes of Christmas

2011-12-13T07:28:00.000-05:00

I am a patent nerd. There. I've said it. It's out. I'm also an information nerd. Where is it? How do you find it? What does it mean? How do you make it useful? So this holiday season I bring you the twelve quotes of Christmas. For the next 12 days I bring you my favorite quotes about patents, information, and how the two converge. So here we go.

"If the inventory of ready-made words in our language determines which concepts you are able to understand, how would you ever learn anything new?"

By Guy Deutscher, Honorary Research Fellow, School of Languages, Linguistics, and Cultures at the University of Manchester.

See my earlier post on this one here.

Licensing Molecules

2011-12-12T07:15:00.002-05:00

Molecule - a group of atoms bonded together, representing the smallest fundamental unit of a chemical compound that can take part in a chemical reaction.

Licensing - a permit from an authority to own or use something, do a particular thing, or carry on a trade.

Cognitive Dissonance - a discomfort caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously - like licensing molecules.

Abbott Labs Licenses Molecules From Reata.

This isn't a patentability debate it's just plain old cognitive dissonance on the headline.

(Reata Pharma has interesting patents with tons of non-patent prior art and lots of drawings of molecules. - It's probably easier to just license them than to try to read the patents.)

Looking for Assignees - Again

2011-12-11T01:32:00.003-05:00

USPTO has issued a Request for Information on enhanced reporting of assignee information on patent and patent application ownership. The need for improved patent assignee data is compelling. If you are manufacturing a product and you figure out that you need a license to a piece of technology, a daunting task by itself, you should be able to at least find the real entity and the real people associated with the entity to see if you can get the license you need. At present, this is a challenge.

Take it from me, trolling the Secretary of State sites, Pacer, and countless other data sources to see who owns Obfuscation Patent Holdings, LLC of Nevada and its various subsidiaries, shell companies, and owners of record is a tiring pursuit. It's entertaining at times when you hit the jackpot and can figure out who owns the mysterious patent that keeps showing up in the cease and desist letters. Usually it's fruitless because hiding ownership of a patent is one of the easiest things you can do at USPTO. It's time for more transparency in patent assignee data and USPTO has provided an opportunity to provide your input on the subject.

Send in your comments, encourage full disclosure.

2011-12-04T23:49:00.003-05:00

The patentability of medical tests that provide insight into how the human body reacts to disease and the drugs designed to treat them is a contentious issue. The test developers want patent protection on the inventions that they claim resulted in their specific discoveries. The medical and access to medicine constituencies believe that these tests are not patentable because they involve both abstract ideas and laws of nature.

Today's Wall Street Journal article provides an interesting overview of the issues, the players, and the upcoming Supreme Court cases.

Patent Pending Pipeline Prognostication

2011-11-27T04:43:00.001-05:00

Here is a statistical mash up of the patent pending pipeline based on information from WIPO and USPTO. Getting a comprehensive set of data for one complete year is hard to do since the publication dates on the different statistics varies from source to source, What one takes away from this pipeline prognostication is that there is a prodigious backlog of patent applications that is growing every year. On a domestic and global basis the number of patents granted each year is less than half the number of new patent applications arriving each year. The precarious position of patent offices world wide portends continued unrest in the patent sphere and the potential decline in protection of precious inventions.

Enough with the Ps. Here's the statistics.

In 2010, the number of unprocessed patent applications world-wide stood at 5.17 million.

As of 2009, the number of patent applications filed globally was about 1.8 million a year. (The last year the global number of patent application is available.)

In 2008, the US share of that number was 482,871, about 27%.

In 2010 the number of US patent applications hit 520,277.

In 2009 the USPTO granted 191,927 patents.

By 2010 the US number of patents granted hit 244,341 - less than half of the volume of new applications coming in the door.

In 2008 the global number of grants was 777,556.

The average patent pendency - the period of time between the time a patent application is filed to the time a patent office makes a final decision - is around 32 months. This number is lower than the US average which stands at about 34 months.

The number of patents in force in the US as of 2009 was 1,930,631. The global number is a confusing hodge podge of counts by national patent office that doesn't lend itself to compiling one consolidated number.

The bottom line is protracted patent pendency persists.

A Magical Journey

2011-11-08T07:51:00.000-05:00

Researchers at the Science Museum in London are embarking on a magical journey to try to build Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine, the computational machine he invented in 1831. The Analytical Engine is a mechanical device designed to handle mathematical computation.

According to today's New York Times Science Times the researchers are planning a 10 year, multi-million dollar (pounds really) adventure to take the blueprints of the various iterations of Mr. Babbage's invention and try to figure out how to actually build it. The effort will include some crowd-sourced review of scanned copies of his drawings to seek suggestions from the public on the effort.

What is exciting about a project like this is the ability to see how the inventor's thinking about his invention evolved. I have always been fascinated about the deep thinking of inventors and the convergence of how inventors invent and serendipitous discovery, serendipitous discovery being the ah ha moment or the discovery of something you didn't know you were looking for in the first place. How did his ideas evolve, how did he change the way he described them - to himself. How did Mr. Babbage translate his thinking onto paper? Did his notes provide a road map to his discovery? In today's digital age with a tendency to just keep modifying the same digital artifacts, do we lose that path to envision another's thought process?

One of the best narratives on Charles Babbage and his analytical inventions and his collaboration with Augusta Ada Kind, Countess of Lovelace can be found in James Gleick's, "The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood."

For the patent cognoscenti out there, it's interesting to consider how this clearly physical mechanical device, designed to handle algorithmic math complete with its physical input media, might be considered in light of business methods patents, patentability of algorithms, and the "it's not patentable if you can do it with a piece of paper and a pencil" argument in today's electrical computational discipline arena.

Edward Tufte Is Coming To Town

2011-10-16T18:41:00.002-04:00

Edward Tufte returns to Washington on November 8th, 10th, and 11th to teach his fabulous one day Presenting Data and Information course. It was one of the best educational investments I've made. It's worth going just for the books. After the course you'll never look at data the same way. It's always an interesting crowd - litigators who need to build compelling evidence presentation, litigation support people who have to translate the litigator's vision into practice, analysts, media people, students, graphic artists, researchers.

It would still be worthwhile for the USPTO to dig down in their budget to find the funds to have Dr. Tufte stop by and see if he can do something about the Patent Office's goofy dashboard that I whined about last year in my Called Edward Tufte post.

A thank you shout-out to the readers who caught the Burger King. v. Wendy's error in last year's post.

Thank You Steve Jobs

2011-10-07T06:04:00.000-04:00

Here is one of my favorite Steve Jobs quotes. We are left to wonder what amazing things were yet to come.

“Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.”

Steve Jobs, Stamford Commencement Address 2005

We'll Miss You Michael Hart

2011-09-12T09:07:00.000-04:00

By Michael Bowman

Michael S. Hart passed away on September 6, 2011. Hart invented ebooks, and founded Project Gutenberg. According to his obituary on the Project Gutenberg page,

"He had been granted access to significant computing power at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. On July 4 1971, after being inspired by a free printed copy of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, he decided to type the text into a computer, and to transmit it to other users on the computer network. From this beginning, the digitization and distribution of literature was to be Hart's life's work, spanning over 40 years." (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Michael_S._Hart)

Project Gutenberg houses more than 36,000 ebooks in the public domain. I have enjoyed a number of them.

Hart’s invention, in recent years, has transformed the publishing world, providing the reading public access to many new authors, and spurring new inventions such as the Nook, Kindle, iPad, and fostering new file formats for the display of written content (e.g., PDF, epub, lit, Mobipocket, Plucker, TealDoc, etc.). Could he have foreseen these subsequent innovations when he decide to post an electronic version of the Declaration of Independence?

Not to detract from Hart’s invention, there was someone else who did envision this technology prior to Hart. Arthur C. Clarke, a polymath, author, and visionary. Perhaps like I did, you read Clarke’s “2001: A Space Odyssey”, and saw Stanley Kubrick’s movie. Maybe you remember this passage:

"When he tired of official reports and memoranda and minutes, he would plug his foolscap-sized Newspad into the ship's information circuit and scan the latest reports from Earth. One by one he would conjure up the world's major electronic papers ... Switching to the display unit's short-term memory, he would hold the front page while he quickly searched the headlines and noted the items that interested him. ... the postage-stamp-sized rectangle would expand until it neatly filled the screen and he could read it with comfort. When he had finished, he would flash back to the complete page and select a new subject for detailed examination. Floyd sometimes wondered if the Newspad, and the fantastic technology behind it, was the last word in man's quest for perfect communications. Here he was, far out in space, speeding away from Earth at thousands of miles an hour, yet in a few milliseconds he could see the headlines of any newspaper he pleased. (That very word "newspaper," of course, was an anachronistic hangover into the age of electronics.) The text was updated automatically on every hour; even if one read only the English versions, one could spend an entire lifetime doing nothing but absorbing the ever-changing flow of information from the news satellites. It was hard to imagine how the system could be improved or made more convenient. But sooner or later, Floyd guessed, it would pass away, to be replaced by something as unimaginable as the Newspad itself would have been to Caxton or Gutenberg."

And in another episode of life imitating art imitating life imitating art...Samsung cited the 2001: A Space Odyssey Newspad as prior art in its ongoing patent war with Apple. Attached hereto as Exhibit D is a true and correct copy of a still image taken from Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film "2001: A Space Odyssey." In a clip from that film lasting about one minute, two astronauts are eating and at the same time using personal tablet computers. The clip can be downloaded online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ8pQVDyaLo. As with the design claimed by the D’889 Patent, the tablet disclosed in the clip has an overall rectangular shape with a dominant display screen, narrow borders, a predominately flat front surface, a flat back surface (which is evident because the tablets are lying flat on the table's surface), and a thin form factor.

Thank you, Michael Hart, and Arthur C. Clarke.

Zero Net Non-Farm Jobs

2011-09-06T18:49:00.001-04:00

By Michael Bowman

The Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its August2011 jobs report on 9/2/11. BLS reported that there were no (zero, zip, nada)net nonfarm jobs added to the US economy for the month. Pay attention nextmonth when that number is revised (unexpectedly) downward, and the"experts" are once again surprised that the actual employmentsituation for September is "unexpectedly" worse than theirprojections.

One of the talking points used to support passage ofpatent reform in the America Invents Act (which is anticipated to occur thisweek) is that it will spur job creation. This seems like a good time to take alook at patents related to hiring.

In the US Patent Classification System, Class 705 is commonlyreferred to as “Business Methods”. Within this class, subclass 321 addressesemployment or hiring. This subclass is new, having been created as part ofUSPTO reclassification efforts over the past few years. In the class 705classification schedule, this subclass is indented under subclasses 1.1(AUTOMATED ELECTRICAL FINANCIAL OR BUSINESS PRACTICE OR MANAGEMENT ARRANGEMENT) and 320 (Human resources). Subject matter to be classified in 705/321 mustalso meet the requirements of their respective definitions. Employment orhiring (subclass 705/321) is defined as:

Subject matter drawn to acomputerized arrangement for engaging the services of a person or persons forwages or other payment either directly or through a third party.

A search note refers also to subclass 705/8. This subclasswas eliminated in Classification Order 1904, released on 2/1/11, and the705/321 schedule has not yet been updated to reflect this change. Searchesshould probably also be conducted in the following class 705 subclasses:

7.12 Resourceplanning, allocation or scheduling for a business operation

7.13 Scheduling,planning, or task assignment for a person or group

7.14 Skill basedmatching of a person or a group to a task

7.15 Statusmonitoring or status determination for a person or group

7.16 Scheduleadjustment for a person or group

7.17 Staff planningin a project environment

7.18 Calendar-basedscheduling for a person or group

7.19 Meeting orappointment

7.21 Taskassignment

7.23 Resourceplanning in a project environment

7.25 Needs basedresource requirements planning and analysis

Returning to 705/321, employment or hiring, there are 51issued patents contained therein as of 9-6-11. We'll take a look at a few ofthese.

The most recently issued (today) patent in 705/321 is number8,015,047, “Method, system, and computer program product for employment marketstatistics generation and analysis”, invented by Foulger, et al. and assignedto Archeron Limited LLC. The original classification (i.e., the highest, mostindented classification accepting the subject matter) for this patent is705/7.14, Skill based matching of a person or a group to a task. Claim 1states:

A method of generating employmentmarket statistics via a network, comprising:

accessing, by a data processing device,an employment resource via the network, the employment resource comprisingdata;

matching, by the data processingdevice, the data to one of a plurality of employment market categories, whereinthe matching includes matching resources to the plurality of employment marketcategories according to a multi-tiered matching strategy;

and updating, by the data processingdevice, at least one statistical indicator associated with a matched employmentmarket category, wherein the updating comprises calculating a ratio of resumesassociated with the matched employment market category to job listingsassociated with the matched employment market category.

Given the huge number of unemployed, or underemployed,workers in the country, screening of job applicants is a potentially criticalbottleneck for human resources departments and hiring managers. Enter patentnumber 7,778,938, “System and method for screening of job applicants”, issued8/17/10 to Stimac and assigned to Accuhire.com Corporation. Claim 1 states:

A method for screening a plurality ofjob applicants comprising:

receiving input to a predeterminedplurality of job related profile questions through at least one input device,which are locked to prevent alteration by the job applicant, wherein theplurality of job related profile questions include at least one job-relatedquestion regarding a preferred work style for a job applicant, that provides anindication of motivation for the job applicant to perform a particular job, andare targeted to a predetermined job opening from the plurality of jobapplicants;

providing a numeral score associatedwith each predetermined response with at least one processor;

and tabulating the total score for allpredetermined responses so that each job applicant can be objectively comparedto other job applicants based on the received input with the at least oneprocessor for viewing on at least one electronic display.

Here is one that might be familiar to millions of onlinejobseekers. Patent number 6,370,510, “Employment recruiting system and methodusing a computer network for posting job openings and which provides forautomatic periodic searching of the posted job openings”, was issued April 9,2002 to McGovern, et al., and assigned to CareerBuilder, Inc. Claim 1 states:

An employment recruiting method,comprising the steps of:

receiving first computer readable data,representing information pertaining to a job, provided by a job seeker user viaa computer network;

automatically periodically comparing saidfirst computer readable data to second computer readable data including jobopening data representing information pertaining to at least one job opening;

and sending said job seeker user amessage informing said job seeker user when said comparing step determines thatsaid first computer readable data matches at least a portion of said secondcomputer readable data, said message including a link to a site at whichadditional data pertaining to said job opening is accessible by said job seekeruser via said link.

The earliest patent found in 705/321 is number 5,117,353,“System for use in a temporary help business”, issued 5/26/92 to Stipanovich,et al. and assigned to Staff-Plus, Inc. The preamble of claim 1 (the entireclaim is too long to include here) states:

A system for use in temporary helpbusinesses for screening temporary help employees, testing said temporary helpemployees for one or more employee skills, recording a time that said temporaryhelp employees are available to perform temporary jobs, receiving and recordingjob orders from one or more clients requesting temporary help personnel withone or more specified required skills to perform temporary jobs, assigning saidtemporary help employees to said temporary jobs, recording client commentsabout said temporary help employees, determining an amount of money due to saidtemporary help employees for specified periods of time, determining an amountof money due from said clients for temporary help services performed by saidtemporary help employees for specified periods of time, and reporting trendsand patterns of said job orders and temporary help employees applications basedon specified input criteria . . .

None of these patents create private sector jobs -- theyprovide tools for more effective and efficient hiring. Contrary to much of whatis reported in the news, and put forth by government, government doesn't createprivate sector jobs either. Specifically, jobs are created primarily by smallemployers (less than 500 employees). And as we know, small business ownerstoday are very averse to hiring given the economic and regulatory uncertaintythey are facing.

Steve Jobs, Inventor

2011-08-26T08:51:00.003-04:00

Today's New York Times tribute to Steve Jobs as revealed in his patents is a fantastic view into the expansive work of a great inventor. A patent stories the way all patent stories should be written.

Thank you Chairman Steve!!!

Patent Urban Legends & Bad Patent Math

2011-08-23T08:39:00.008-04:00

New and improved patent urban legends that are popping up all over the place. Patents are hot and every business journalist is checking in with their vision of what's happening in the patentsphere. Newly enhanced patent urban legends are breaking out all over the place. And the numbers are taking on a life of their own without much in the way of fact checking.

The most popular is the Intellectual Ventures (IV) patent count. On May 27, 2009 the Seattle Times reported that IV held 27,000 patents. Two years later on May 31, 2011 an IV press release announcing an intellectual property agreement with Micron says that the IV patent portfolio is more than 30,000 IP assets. (IP assets as in patents or as in licensing agreements or something else - who knows?) By June 28th the count was up to 35,000 patents. There is no way to figure out if these numbers are true or what they are made up of. So, the legend lives. There is no way of knowing if these patents are worth anything, if they can be commercialized, or if they are even valid. All we know is that there are a lot of them.

The latest trending patent urban legend has to do with how many patents cover inventions in the wireless space. During Google's pre-Motorola acquisition, Google's Senior Vice President and Chief Legal Officer David Drummond noted in a post on Google's Official Blog that "a smart phone might involve more than 250,000 (largely questionable) patent claims." Patent claims - not patents.

Patent 101 - each claim in a patent is an invention. A claim starts with a capital letter and ends with a period.

If the average US patent has 20 claims then Mr. Drummond was throwing around a number of about 12,500 patents (12,500 x 20 = 250,000 right?). Not a small number. But here comes the multiplier effect.

Today, Una Galani and Reynolds Holding's names appear on the byline under an article of titled, "A Murky Patent War" that, "Google cannot identify all the patents that may cover... the Android operating system. The company's chief legal officer says as many as 250,000 patents might apply to a smartphone." Not patent claims as Mr. Drummond said in his post but patents.

So we went from about 12,500 patents, depending on your favorite average number of claims divisor, to 250,000 patents in about 20 days. If we really want to blow it out we can take the Reuters number of 250,000 patents and extend it to the number of inventions (claims) in each patent so the new number of patent claims would be 5 Million patent claims. The legend grows.

But during the 20 days between Mr. Drummond's original posting and the Reuters article, Google bought Motorola mobility which owns 17,500 patents according to the press and another 7,500 patent applications. How will the press factor that in? What will be the new patent math?

The Reuters Breaking Views article adds that "A reasonable approach would be stricter approval of standards." I don't even know what that means? What standards? The standards of patentability which are spelled out in Title 35, Section 101? Standards vs. examination procedures? And who should approve the standards, the patent examiners? The courts? Who's responsible for this stricter approval of standards being recommended?

According to Reuters, Ms. Galani is a Middle East correspondent based in the United Arab Emirates. Maybe she should get a pass on this one since it appears she wrote the first piece on rethinking Libya and oil prices. But Mr. Holding is a lawyer who has what appears to be extensive experience in business and law reporting. Did they check anything before they published this stuff?

This new patent math and uninformed commentarydoesn't help the conversation on what's going on with patents. It fills up a lot of space in the business section but that's about it. The average reader leaves this article thinking how could there be 250,000 patents on a smart phone and that the way to fix the problem is to have stricter approval of standards.

The path to constructive improvements in the patent dialog is information transparency and statements of facts. Intellectual Ventures should cough up the list of all their "IP assets", Mr Drummond should be more specific about his 250,000 patent claims and why he things they are largely questionable, and reporters from Reuters and the folks at the New York Times who distributed the story should get the facts, even if it's hard.

Patent Week and It's Only Wednesday

2011-08-17T17:11:00.005-04:00

It's Patent Week at major media outlets.

Here are the highlights so far:

Today - August 17th - Wall Street Journal: Kodak Launches Sale of Patents

Then there's Verizon hoping that the acquisition of Motorola Mobility will calm the patent war with a form of patent detente.

Tuesday - August 16th - New York Times: A Bull Market in Tech Patents

Reuter's Breaking Views has an article called, "Reading Palm" about HP's purchase of Palm and its cache of patents.

Then there's Google's $12.5B Gamble - one of hundreds of articles about Google's acquisition of Motorola Mobility

And, "Google's Deal Shakes Up Asia's Mobile Landscape," what happens when you go from being partners to competitors overnight.

On Monday there was the announcement of the Google deal (complete with a video) This was closely followed by an article in the WSJ on how the Google Deal Complicates Microsoft's Strategy.

And it's only Wednesday.

By the end of the week we'll find out that Nathan Mynhold actually owns a million patents instead of the current urban legend of 35,000.

Stay tuned.

Goog, Moto and the Patent Bonanza!!

2011-08-15T10:06:00.006-04:00

Google buying Motorola Mobility changes the whole wireless patent war landscape. I wonder how the Rockstar Bidco guys feel about this one. $4B for the Nortel patents, $12.5B for the Moto mobility portfolio and all the stuff that goes along with it. Looks like they got more patents for their billions and a considerably lower per patent price.

So consider the following. Microsoft is hooked up with Nokia. Google has Moto. RIM has a bunch of stuff and the Multimedia Trust patents that go back to the Netravali days. And Apple has well Apple.

Do you think Carl Icahn was in on the deal? Was he having the red herring conversation to distract everyone while Google closed their deal?

Now things are really getting interesting. A patent attorney's bonanza. Here comes the big cross licensing deal and we all lived happily ever after with our cool mobile devices.

Stay tuned.

Indicia of Extortion

2011-08-09T04:19:00.005-04:00

Here is one of my new favorite additions to my glossary of real life patent practice exegesis from the non-practicing entity part of the patent landscape:

Indicia of Extortion - filing nearly identical patent infringement complaints against a plethora of diverse defendants where the plaintiff (the guy filing the lawsuit) followed each filing with a demand for a quick settlement at a price far lower than the cost to defend the litigation.

Please cue the Sopranos music again.

A shout out to Judge Lourie for such an eloquently phrased definition of this practice which is found in the CAFC decision in Eon-Net LP v. Flagstar Bancorp.

Calling Michael Porter

2011-08-08T12:21:00.004-04:00

The snarky exchanges between Google and Microsoft continue. The latest is "When patents attack Android" a shallow attempt at riding the anti-patent troll sentiment generated by the NPR This American Life broadcast, "When Patents Attack." The exchanges are taking place on Twitter and the Google blogs - a testament to the reach of new technology in the public relations wars.

Google is pouting that the Rockstar Bidco bullies are trying to prevent them from selling Android devices. It's not fair. It's hindering innovation. That the Rockstar guys are banding together to add $15.00 per device to the cost of each and every Android device. (The $15 number is another one of those patent urban legend numbers that lives on its own without a lot of detail behind it.) I pay a premium every time I buy an Apple device and I'm happy to do it because I perceive that I am getting value for my purchase. Do these guys really think that a $15 surcharge is going to be a critical factor in a user's decision to buy an Android device?

And what about that dubious statement that "A smartphone might involve as many as 250,000 (largely questionable) patent claims, and our competitors want to impose a "tax" for these dubious patents that make Android devices more expensive for consumers." So where did this come number come from? I'm sure this commentary endear's Google with the folks at USPTO but more importantly, if google was so worried about the "largely questionable patent claims" why didn't you challenge the claims when the applications were published instead of waiting for your competitors to whack you in the head with the granted patents? (I like the fact that the link to the word might included in the post sends you to a Financial Times article that you can't read unless you are a registered user - way to go on the transparency front.)

Perhaps it might be a good time for these smart guys at Google to take a look at some of Michael Porter's work on competitive advantage and competitive strategy. There is the part about first mover advantages in which the first guy in a market has a competitive advantage and the other guys play catch up. . Kind of like Apple running Nokia and RIM out of the smartphone market and leaving Microsoft empty handed in the tablet market. Apple had first mover advantages in the smartphone/touchscreen world - oh and great design and an awesome marketing plan.

Lots of patent guys get this first mover thing - consider Apple and the iPod and Apple and the iTunes store. Apple, a patent savvy organization, licensed the infamous One-Click patent from Amazon. While I could fill pages with a discussion on whether business methods patents like the Amazon One-Click patent are valid or useful, that's not the point. Patent savvy guys figure out what they need to license, get the best price they can, build it into their cost structure and head out to the market to sell their stuff. Ask Barnes & Noble what happened to their 1999 holiday sales when they didn't have a license for the One Click patent.

Then consider barriers to entry - yep, patents are one of those things that restrict entry into an industry - in this case the mobile device space. Note to Google - see the Polaroid v. Kodak case where Polaroid kept Kodak out of the instant camera business. It wasn't pretty. When you enter the game late, the playing field isn't level. The guys who got there first have competitive advantage.

Google pointed out in its blog post that DOJ is demanding the winning group (Microsoft, Oracle, Apple, RIM, Sony, EMC) give a license to the open source software community. What's curious here is that Google seems to imply that this is a done deal - that the Rockstar team is going to be forced to license the technology. It doesn't look like DOJ has finalized such a demand yet. This doesn't change the equation though - developers of Android products are still going to have to pay royalties, the real question is where will the numbers come out in light of the earlier $15.00/device royalty. Things are not going to change any time soon.

I find it interesting that a company founded on a patent is whining that patents are impeding their ability to innovate. Maybe Google should take part of the money it didn't spend on acquiring the Nortel patents and invite Dr. Porter in for a discussion on the state of the technology markets and how to achieve competitive advantage.

Patents Are Stifling Innovation - Really?

2011-08-06T00:47:00.008-04:00

The conversation starts the usual way. Business owner comes in to talk about a patent predicament. Usually with a cease and desist letter in hand, the business owner has discovered that there is a patent out there that covers some feature of their product or service and the business owner is mad. This patent is "stifling innovation." Or to quote Kent Walker General Counsel of Google on Google's own patent predicament, "patents are Gumming up innovation."

The mandatory non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements are signed before the real conversation begins. The business owner never looked into patents when they started their new internet or software juggernaut. Patents are boring and hard to read. The process of building the company was hard enough, there was no time to dig into patents, there were products to release, investors to find, customers to sell to, accountants to meet, Tweets to write, conferences to go to. Now the business owner is mad that some "troll" is coming along and trying to extort money from their hard work. Oh, and here's a copy of my EULA that has language protecting the company's intellectual property. Make this go away. Then comes the phrase I always wait for, "THIS ISN'T FAIR."

Let the hunt begin - that quest for prior art that will kill off the patent that has become the fly in the ointment of business growth, the patent that is stifling innovation.

If you want to hear how this conversation usually goes down across the intellectual property landscape, the check out the latest podcast at This Is My Next. At around the 50 minute mark the conversation turns to patents, Google's pouting about how it's not fair that the guys who own patents are coming after Android and the rest of the technology patent wars. Joshua Topolsky and Nilay Patel go at it. Imagine Joshua Topolsky as the disgruntled business owner and Nilay Patel as the patent attorney (he really is a patent attorney) reasoning with his client. It's an anecdote to all the patents are terrible patents are stifling innovation vitriol out there. The patent spat is enlightening and rest of the podcast is worth a listen too.

Patent Trolls, Lodsys and Business Methods Patents

2011-07-25T20:48:00.006-04:00

Cue the Soprano's music...

Listen to NPR's This American Life podcast "When Patent's Attack" a great piece of reporting on the scourge of the patent trolls, their impact on companies and innovation, and what's going on with the cookbook developers at Intellectual Ventures. The reporting has an interesting spin on the current Lodsys attacks on Apple and Android app developers.

It's worth a listen.

Then have a look at the RICO laws.

Rockstar Bidco and the Patent Wars

2011-07-09T23:23:00.004-04:00

Rockstar Bidco is the name of the consortium set up to bid on the Nortel patents - AAPL. MSFT, EMC, ERIC, and RIMM. Nice to see that these guys have sense of humor.

The early press noted that the Google bid seemed to be some kind of nerd play on math. The Rockstar Bidco was the announcement that the big guys have come out to play. Now the drama continues.

According to the Washington Post the Justice Department is stepping in to see if this move will block the development of Android devices. Don't patent provide the owner with the exclusive right to block someone else from using the patented invention unless they buy a license? Isn't that one of those patent basics?

This is another article about patents that reports that activity in the patent space is going to have a dramatic impact on markets and innovation without any real discussion of the patents or why they are important or why we should care.

"Google's rivals...combined forces to prevent the company from buying a critical trove of patents." (Did they prevent Google from buying the patents or simply make sure that they bought them? Is there something nefarious here? Didn't Google let everyone know their price point before the actual auction date?)

"..6,000 patents covering an array of wireless and Internet technologies.....touching nearly every aspect of telecommunications and additional markets as well, including Internet search and social networking."

Here's Google the Internet search giant who missed out on the acquisition of this treasure trove of patent goodies but the article doesn't have word on what the Internet search patents are about or if these will have any impact on Google, the Internet search giant. Perhaps it is 7,895,183 - Associative Search Engine - an invention that relates to an advertisement machine which provides advertisements to a user searching for desired information within a data network. (Didn't Google invent this business model?)

Then there's the question of why the portfolio was worth a "whopping $4.5 billion" and the question from a leading antitrust lawyer about "Why is the portfolio worth five times more to this group collectively than it is to Google?" There are lots of potential reasons. Bad bidding by Google. Bad advise. Failure to recognize that a consortia can form just for the purposes of buying the patents. Insurance that the Rockstars would get the patents vs. not knowing how they will surface later. A good investment decision to lock out the new kids on the block. Fear of one of those patent assertion entities aka "The Trolls getting their hands on them."

My favorite quote in the article that the price paid demonstrates, "the growing dysfunction of the country's patent system, where even the most amorphous ideas can be rubber-stamped by the government and protected for years." First, ideas can't be patented. Please refer to that whole Bilski Supreme Court thing that makes clear that abstract ideas aren't patentable. Second, even a cursory look at what was in the Nortel portfolio makes it clear that there are some extremely valuable inventions there. Finally, rubber-stamped? Really? If USPTO was rubber-stamping everything it wouldn't take so long to get a patent. (Yeah, I know there is some junk in there but I think "rubber-stamping" is a little naive about the tortuous process of getting a patent in the first place.)

Then there's the quote in the Financial Times from Eric Schmidt that the $4.5B exceeded Google's value threshold. Mr. Schmidt added that Google is worried that this is an attempt to use patents rather than to innovate. The Nortel patents are very valuable innovations. The Rockstars thought they had value so they spent some serious dough. But then there's this whole discussion about patents vs. innovation. Patents are what you get for innovating. When you innovate you want to get patents. This statement about using patents rather than innovating is discordant to say the least. Besides Google has a market cap of $171.43B and $36.68B in cash. $4.5B seems like a good investment to protect the future of Android.

Who knows where this will end up but it will make for some interesting drama.

The end of this discussion is no where in sight.

Rock On.

Curiosity Counts

2011-04-26T15:40:00.001-04:00

Here is a very cool infographic timeline Gutenberg to ipad...

curiosity counts - A visual timeline of the “the press,” from...

Apple v Samsung - Two Great Blog Posts

2011-04-19T14:24:00.002-04:00

After finishing my morning work out with Rex Parker I wandered over to the Wall Street Journal to see what they had to say about the Apple v. Samsung case. An ok analysis for most but for us IP junkies it simply wasn't enough. General statements about patent and trademark infringement, a couple of pictures on one of the AllThingsD blog but not much to give you a feel for the scope of what's really going on. Is there some reason why the WSJ never puts the patent numbers on any of their IP articles? Are we just not smart enough to read them ourselves?

So, I went on the hunt. Here are two blog posts that have the goods on what's going on.

First, FOSS Patents written by Florian Mueller click here to read his post.

The second is ThisIsMyNext - the temporary home of Joshua Topolsky, Nilay Patel, Paul Miller, Joanna Stern, Ross Miller, and Chris Ziegler. Here's Nilay Patel's post - click here.

Patent Allowance and Business Methods

2011-04-06T20:44:00.005-04:00

Mark Nowotarski, Mike Bowman, and I wrote a guest article on IP Watchdog that was posted today. The article, "Increasing Patent Allowance Rates by Selectively Targeting a More Technological Patent Class" deals with how the class assigned to your patent can drive patent allowance. You can read the article by clicking here.

Thanks to Gene Quinn of IP Watchdog for having us in his online magazine.

New Business Methods White Paper

2011-04-01T10:41:00.004-04:00

Our business methods guru, Mike Bowman, has taken a look at the Patent Reform Act of 2011 and how its tax strategy language has the potential to impact firms in the insurance and financial services arena who hold or use patents with tax strategy elements. For our latest insight on what's happening in business methods patents please click here to download the white paper, US Patent Reform Act of 2011 - Implications for Insurance and Financial Firms.

We published another important paper focused on the impact of business methods patents on university technology transfer and commercialization efforts - Business Methods Patent and Technology Transfer. It provides some compelling examples of the types of business methods patents that are appearing in the healthcare and medical research domains. Please enjoy them and let us know what you think. I like the handwashing method with onboard entertainment!!

Please let us know what you think.

The Timeless Challenge of the Language of Inventions

2011-03-20T10:10:00.005-04:00

The challenge of finding the right words to describe innovations and inventions is timeless. The inventor needs to create a vocabulary for something that hasn't been described before. But with what words? New words made up to convey the inventor's intent? Old words that convey the concept but not the new meaning?

A 1873 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine discussing the invention of the telegraph presents the inventor's conundrum,

"The difficulty of forming a clear conception of the subject is

increased by the fact that while we have to deal with novel and strange facts, we have also to use old words in novel and inconsistent senses."

"The Difficulty of Forming a Clear Conception" : The Telegraph, Harper's New Monthly Magazine, 366 as cited in The Information by James Gleick

Curious Technology Transfer Moment

2011-03-08T18:12:00.004-05:00

I was chatting with several technology transfer gurus involved in some of the most advanced biomedical and biomedical engineering discoveries. The conversation moved to the difficulty of figuring out what is going on in the world of patents and inventions. Not wanting to miss an opportunity to plug Coronado IP and its transformational search capabilities, I delivered my elevator speech. The conversation took a curious turn. The technology transfer gurus told me that they never buy new search technology, that they don't believe in being early adopters and wait for the technology to be mature before investing. What????

To recap, some of the people who are steeped in inventions, patents, and bringing innovations to the marketplace don't believe in buying new technology. My head hurts.

Music and the Business Methods Conundrum

2011-02-23T00:07:00.005-05:00

One of the important topics of debate in Business Methods patents circles is where these patents fit along the information technology continuum. At it's heart is the "What does it do?" vs. "What do you do with it?" nexus. This is what a semiconductor does, this is what a disk drive does, this is what memory does; this is what you do with it - use it to process on-line banking transactions, to create customer loyalty programs, to place sensors on fish and track them so anglers don't have to work so hard. "What does it do?" and "What do you do with it?" have become essential questions in the information age quest to define the boundaries of patentability.

The Gutenberg printing press with it movable metal type and Johannes Gutenberg's creation of oil-based colored and black inks brought books and the knowledge they contained to a far broader audience than before. Depending on your perspective, this may be the earliest entry in the information technology continuum. Gutenberg focused on the printed word.

Ottaviano Petrucci is believed to be one of the first to print music using the Gutenberg movable type process. He used the movable type in a multiple-impression process where one run was for the staves - the five parallel lines, another for the words or decorative elements, and the final for the notes. There is some dispute on whether Petrucci's approach was a double impression or multiple impression process. According to the Center for Intellectual Property & Information Law Petrucci received a twenty year patent for the double impression process. This was one of the earliest records of patents for inventions and improvement in music printing. You can read the translation of the patent grant here.

According to Joanna Kostylo and the University of Cambridge, three years lapsed between Petrucci's petition for a patent and publication of the first work under the patent "Harmonice Muscices Odecaton A." Start ups take note; the time to get a patent and get your product to market is never short.

Even the Renaissance had its patent issues. Petrucci's early activity in the printed music market drew competitors. Andrea Antico was granted a patent to print music using a woodcut method focused on printing keyboard music. Petrucci received a new exclusive right to print organ music. The two printers were competitors. According to Ms. Kostylo, the pope withdrew Petrucci's organ patent because he failed to produce music for keyboards under his patent. The two inventors battled it out in the market place for printed music.

This brings us back to business methods. Did Petrucci get a patent for a business method; using the Gutenburg movable type invention to create printed sheet music? Was sheet music one of the early example of the "What Does It Do" vs. "What Do You Do With It" nexus?

The links to the Petrucci patents above are great if you want to have a look at some very early patents.

Grim Outlook for USPTO

2011-01-28T13:42:00.007-05:00

Today's Watch Dog Report in the Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel provides a grim outlook on the state of affairs at USPTO. The article, " Despite efforts to improve, US patent approvals move slower" highlights the impact of long pendencies, budget freezes, attrition and a host of other ills. John Schmid wrote, "...the US wastes at least $6.4 Billion each year in "forgone invention" - legitimate technology ht cannot get licenses and start-ups that cannot get funded because of US Patent Office problems."

The horror stories of patent applications languishing on the floors of examiners offices for years are distressing. When you consider the current political and economic chants about innovation, and research and development; reports that the Chinese want to file a million patent applications by 2015 with a good number of them landing here, an the accelerating pace of the creation of complex technical and scientific documents and no subject matter experts to review all this stuff; PTO seems to be in for a rough ride.

You can read the article at here. Thanks to Greg Aharonian of Internet Patent News Service for passing the report along.

A New Ideas to Market Nexus

2011-01-12T07:12:00.009-05:00

Cleveland Clinic and MedStar announced a new collaboration to bring more medical inventions to market. Read the article in yesterday's Washington Post here.

The Post reports that this is one of the first partnerships where a health services system is partnering with the holder of life sciences patents to leverage the health systems clinical experts to commercialize patented inventions.

One of the interesting items in the article is the nexus between adoption of electronic health records and finding more opportunities to reach out to other experts to collaborate. "With improvements in electronic health records, more health systems will be turning to such collaborations to tap into the expertise of other organizations, officials said.'

Calling Alan Gilbert....here's an extension of the collaboration model.

This is good news for inventors, for clinicians, and for patients and an interesting twist on commercialization to cut the time to market for innovations.

Coronado IP and the Power of Concept Searching

2011-01-10T13:09:00.000-05:00

“Noscitur a Sociis”

A word is known by the company it keeps.

Frosty the Article Holding Figurine

2010-12-17T10:10:00.005-05:00

Dick Tracy, It's Time to Upgrade Your Watch

2010-12-08T01:56:00.006-05:00

Freedom to Operate is never easy especially when the first thing you have to do is figure out how what you've invented fits in with everything that everyone else has invented and patented. Imagine if what you've invented is an upgrade to the iconic Dick Tracy watch.

Yesterday I read Nick Bilton's New York Times Bits blog post "An iPod Watch Project Explodes Online." Minimal, an industrial design firm based in Chicago, has a plan to incorporate the new iPod Nano into an elegantly designed watch housing. (There are many beautiful items that they designed on Minimal's website.) The project was supported by users at Kickstarter.com who donated $25 to the project in exchange they will receive the watch kit when it becomes available. They raised over $500,000. I wondered how the Freedom to Operate investigation is going.

We went down this path a while ago on the wristwatch front. The Dick Tracy watch investigation yielded a fine collection of wrist instruments with radios and clocks and video, oh my. Minimal's kit takes an existing product and enhances it with a new housing. Then presto, a new addition to the wrist instrument category.

In the comments Mr. Bilton's readers added a fine collection of new product features - leather and fabric bands, phone features, Bluetooth headphones - one doesn't want the iconic white ear buds connect by its white wire to your wrist - unless of course, there is a very long cord. One commenter added a list of questions - how long will the battery last? Will it have an alarm? (Think early Casio and the Timex Beep watch.) Others wanted phone features. Then there was the usability comments citing its value as a device for kids so they won't lose it and for runners.

So what exactly are the boundaries of this invention? Is this another case of convergence - a watch band and housing meet the iPod? Is this a new housing? Is it a new iPod accessory? How will LG with it's recently FCC approved and 2009 Consumer Electronics Show attention getting LG GD910 wrist instrument gizmo feel about this new entry into the market? And what about Steve Jobs?

Freedom to operate aside, I want one.

Electric Mirror's New Patent for the Tech Savvy Traveler

2010-11-24T11:26:00.007-05:00

There is just something about beautiful architecture and well thought out hotel design that adds to the travel experience. A hotel that is well done and has lots of pleasing surprises is just delightful. The dazzling lobbies, the beautiful attention to detail - from the door handles to the broadloom in the hallways to the way the light flows through the windows and then of course there's the technology. It's more than just having a nice parking space for your IPod or having easy to access WiFi, it's all the other cool stuff like the buttons in your room to let the housekeeping people you'd like to have your room made up without screaming to the hallway passers by, "HEY THIS ROOM IS EMPTY, COME STEAL MY STUFF." But the coolest new hotel toy is the in-mirror TV. You can watch the stock ticker rolling across the screen while blow drying or keep abreast of your favorite sporting event while showering or brushing your teeth. These new in-mirror TV's are the latest and coolest hospitality industry addition for "Tech Savvy Guests".

So when I received a recent email from Aaron Mischel of Electric Mirror in Everett, Washington that featured their Top Story "Electric Mirror Receives Key Patent for Lighted Mirror TVs", I was intrigued. It is the first time I have received marketing emails for a product that not only incorporated information about their products and their customers - the email featured lots of interesting links to their projects and their clients - it incorporated the announcement of the award of their patent complete with links to the patent, and an image of the first page and some of the drawings from the patent itself. Patent 7,805,260 was granted September 28th, 2010.

Claim 1 reads:

1. A mirror assembly mountable to a wall, the mirror assembly comprising: (a) a mirror platform having a front surface and a rear surface; (b) a chassis mountable to the mirror platform; (c) at least one electrical component disposed between the mirror platform and the chassis; (d) an electrical passageway formed within the chassis for allowing the electrical component to be placed into communication with a power source located remotely from the mirror assembly; and (e) a recess formed within the chassis for housing a connection between the power source and the electrical component such that the chassis can be mounted substantially flush against the wall when the electrical component is electrically connected to the power source.

This is a pretty tight claim.

Here is an elegantly designed product complete with the patent to protect it from an American company complete with a waterproof remote control and mirror defoggers. What more could a traveler ask for?

Six Degrees of Software & Software Patents

2010-11-18T02:59:00.007-05:00

The Six Degrees of Software is the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon for nerds. It works like this - pick something that you do and see how far you can go before you run into something that uses software. The answer is, NOT FAR. And software is getting closer all the time.

Consider the toaster...heating element with a timer. Pretty simple. What about a heating element with a timer and an LED display connected to the wall outlet connected to the digital electric meter connected to your house connected to the grid which is connected to the electric company....

Consider the car wash...

The barber seems to be low tech until you make your appointment on line.

So, software patents are always an interesting and often heated topic of conversation. Pick your topic and then consider who owns the patents:

Convergence of the open source software world and patents
What's controlling your surgery - the surgeorn or the Da Vinci Robot or the software?
Business Methods patents - software as the brick and mortar of the new millenium or Still Life with Flow Chart?
How will anyone ever figure out what the essential patents are so the Smart Grid can be built?
Who owns the patents for electronic health records?

If you want to have some fun, Google (now a verb) Microsoft Burning the Ships. Burning the Ships is the story of Microsoft's efforts to play nice where its patents and the open source world collide. It's interesting that the patent attorney blogs find it a compelling tome while the software guys are incredulous about the new and friendly Microsoft.

In our quest to advance the discourse on software patents, business methods (software patents by another name), and open source we call your attention to an interesting blog written by Florian Mueller that focuses on Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) and patents. Mr. Mueller's blog is not for the faint of heart - it's packed with information but if you want some interesting insight into the complexity of the issues. Check it out and then go back and consider the six degrees of software in your professional and personal life.

Business Methods Updates

2010-11-17T01:22:00.004-05:00

Our Business Methods colleagues are at it again. They are providing insight into the recent changes to the e-shopping business methods patent class schedules published by USPTO. Mike Bowman is walking through the changes to help us all understand how things are evolving.

I'll be adding their posts here soon but in the meantime you can check them out at Business Methods Modus Operandi, our blog focused exclusively on business methods patents.

Business Methods Patent Stats Fall 2010

2010-10-26T00:14:00.005-04:00

Business Methods Patents represent the new frontier in intellectual property. These are the digital inventions of the new millennium. Business Methods remain a nascent part of the US and international patent universe that continue to grow in number and importance. Our Business Methods analysts took a look at the status quo in Class 705 to provide insight on this important domain.

As of September 28, 2010, USPTO had issued 51,558 patents that are classified as business methods. The table below provides the breakdown of where these patents are classified.

Area	Count
Planning and Innovation	4,412
Marketing, Selling, Evangelizing	9,198
Exchanging Money for Stuff	19,315
Watching the Store	8,650
The Protection Racket	9,871
None of the Above	112
Total	51,558

Here's a quick look at how we define the major areas where USPTO groups business methods patents. For more detailed insight see our earlier Business Methods Monday posts.

The Patent Office defines Business Methods Patents as those patents classified under Class 705 - Data Processing: Financial, Business Practice, Management or Cost/Price Determination. The high level definition put forward by USPTO is:

Machines and methods for performing data processing or calculation operations in the:

Practice, administration or management of an enterprise, or
Processing of financial data, or
Determination of the charge for goods and services.

PTO defines four classes as business methods patents but includes a fifth in class 705 which has do with business cryptography and digital security. We use our own group titles to describe what is going on in the Business Methods Arena. They conform to the USPTO groupings but are a little easier to understand.

Planning and Innovation - Determining who your customers are and the products and services they want or need. USPTO describes this as Operations Research and Market Analysis.

Marketing, Selling, Evangelizing -- These patents are about informing customers that you exist, showing them your products and services and encouraging and providing incentives for them to make purchases. This covers advertisement management catalog systems, incentive programs and redemption of coupons.

Exchanging Money for Stuff -- This group of business methods patents covers all aspects of exchanging money and credit before, during, and after a business transaction. This includes what you would expect - credit and loan processing, point of sale systems, billing, funds transfer, banking, clearing houses, tax processing and investment planning. (Investment planning seems a little out of place.)

Minding the Store - Here you'll find the patents that deal with tracking resources, money and products. USPTO places patents having to do with human resource management, scheduling, accounting, and inventory monitoring in this group.

A Protection Racket -- The fifth and final group has to do with encryption and digital security. USPTO groups business cryptography here. When USPTO presents does their business methods presentations this group is not called out specifically as business methods patents but since it resides in Class 705 you need to view it as part of the business methods picture.

Business Methods Monday - USPTO Update

2010-09-26T11:10:00.004-04:00

News from last week's USPTO's Business Methods Partnership Meeting:

Only the patents classified in Class 705 are considered business methods patents.

The allowance rate for applications classified in Class 705 is 23% or put another way 77% are rejected or abandoned.

80% of the patents in this class are tied to a computer.

Pendency to First Office Action is 31.7 months - over 2.5 years.

Pendency to Issue/Abandonment is 46.7 months - almost 4 years.

Through July 2010 there are 312 Examiners focused on business methods patents. Through July 2,100 patents have been granted.

In 2009 there were 1,725 patents granted with an Examiner Corps of 328 examiners.

(Patents up...Examiners down...)

They expect the pace for business methods patent filings to increase both as a result of the resolution of the Bilski case by the Supreme Court and an improving economy.

Patent Argot

2010-09-22T17:08:00.006-04:00

If the inventory of ready-made words in our language determines which concepts you are able to understand, how would you ever learn anything new? -- Guy Deutscher, Honorary Research Fellow, School of Languages, Linguistics, and Cultures at the University of Manchester.

This quote in a recent New York Times Magazine distills both the challenge and the triumph of a patent. The ability, in a single sentence, to stake a claim to an invention and define the boundaries of what is yours. Then to use that single sentence as the framework to describe how to make or use it your invention. A single sentence to describe something novel. The choice of words, their structure, and the links to the instructions in your specification will all determine if you have an invention that will generate revenue or an invention that will have a nice certificate that you can hang in your office. This unique language and vocabulary and the structure and flow of innovations, inventions and patents is the Patent Argot - the special and secret language of patents and inventions.

For many, the Patent Argot vocabulary of patents is an impenetrable wall between business owners and entrepreneurs and understanding which patents are relevant to your business and which are not. It is the Patent Argot is what keeps you from finding things. It is part of why you are never sure if your freedom to operate report has really covered all the subject matter. It's what drives that strange feeling you get when you've read a patent and you say to yourself, I read English and I have no idea what this thing says.

An argot is, "a specialized idiomatic vocabulary that is peculiar to a particular class of people (the Intellectual Property and Patent Cognoscenti.) One dictionary defines it as a special language, especially that of an underworld group, devised for private communication and identification; a language with its own style, grammar, and vocabulary. While the underworld group aspect of the definition might resonate with anyone who's ever received a Cease and Desist letter, Patent Argot is a salient feature of almost any patent you read (or write.)

Inventions have always created new vocabulary. The Patent Office allows inventors to be their on lexicographer - to create their own dictionary of specific terms that can be used to describe their inventions as long as the definitions of these words are "accurate, complete, unambiguous, and concise" - a tall order.

Creating new words to describe inventions has been around for as long as man has been inventing things. In the 1500s, Leonardo Da Vinci created his own inventive argot. His first flying machine was defined as the "ornithopter" - ornithos for bird and pteron for wing. (The Notebooks of Da Vinci may provide insightful prior art.) In 1863 Ponton D'Amecourt invented the term helicopter to define his flying machine - "helico" spiral - "pter" for wings. The contemporary spin is the VTOL - the Vertical Take Off and Landing vehicle.

Another important feature of the Patent Argot is the desire to craft language that is as broad as possible so that your patent can reach into the future to cover things not yet invented. Fuzzy boundaries on an invention that can be defined in context help a patent be more flexible. It is a language that uses today's vocabulary in the broadest possible way to compensate for a future we cannot foresee at the moment a claim is crafted.

It is why we have Portable Law Enforcement Data Processing Devices (handheld parking ticket issuing devices) or make purchases on Amazon.com or the iTunes Store using a single action ordering system. It's also why you need to look for new ways to search so you can bypass the Patent Argot and use a framework that understands that nutriceuticals are dietary or nutritional supplements or that a toaster is also a heating element with a timer without you having to tell it so. (Shameless plug for Coronado IP.)

In the Patent Argot posts we'll explore the impact of the secret language of patents and how understanding it will help you understand the secret world of patents and of course, help you Search The Way You Think.

Are You Ready for Some Football?

2010-09-19T12:21:00.003-04:00

The South Carolina Gamecocks are 3-0. A very nice start. Drew Brees and the Saints won their opener but it was filled with tense moments. The Redskins beat the Cowboys, just barely, and Rex Ryan’s mother is upset with him because of his colorful choice of language. And, fantasy football season is in full swing.

Fantasy Football is basically a Computerized Statistical Football Game – A method and apparatus for playing football on a computer system based upon actual football performances by a database of football players. The computer football game is played by a league of individuals, each of whom can individually, or in groups, own a franchise. Franchises select their players in an initial draft. The starting players are then selected by individual franchise owners. Wins and losses for the computer football games occur by calculating a total of each individual player’s points who make up the team. The calculation of points is done automatically either manually or using actual weekly performance by individual NFL players as the basis for determining points.

So reads the abstract of US Patent 4,918,603 filed in August 1, 1988 and granted April 17, 1990. A pretty quick turnaround by the Patent Office.

This patent is cited as being the seminal work in patenting of fantasy sports inventions. The patent is classified as an amusement device – a simulated athletic event including a simulated projectile (I’m guessing that would be the football) that includes a means for processing electronic data. Is this a game or is it a business method? Is it a game that is a business method?

One of the inventors, Patrick Hughes, who had been playing fantasy football with his friends, patented his version of the game, secured a license with the NFL Players Association and NFL properties and proceeded to find a corporate sponsor, Miller Brewing Company. With Miller’s backing the game was soon being played in 6,300 sports bars around the country.

The inventors went on to extend their fantasy sports empire to basketball where they received an endorsement from Cal Ripkin, Jr. and basketball where Grant Hill became part of their celebrity deal. Fox Sports even had a version branded as Terry Bradshaw Fantasy Football.

The ‘603 patent has three claims – one independent and two dependent. Here are all three claims:

What is claimed is:

1. A computer for playing football based upon actual football games, comprising:

means for setting up individual football franchises;

means for drafting actual football players into said franchises;

means for selecting starting player rosters from said actual football players;

means for trading said actual football players;

means for scoring performances of said actual football players based upon actual game scores such that franchises automatically calculate a composite win or loss score from a total of said individual actual football players' scores;

said players' scores are for quarterbacks, running backs and pass receivers in a first group and kickers in a second group; and

wherein said players in said first and second groups receive bonus points.

2. The apparatus according to claim 1, wherein said bonus points for said first and seconds groups are based upon complex or difficult plays.

3. The apparatus according to claim 2, wherein said complex and difficult plays include extra points for a quarterback who receives or runs for said touchdown, extra points for said running back for throwing or receiving a touchdown pass, and extra points for said pass receive for passing the ball or running for a touchdown.

Here are some links to some of the inventor’s other sports fantasy patents.

7614944 – Systems and methods for providing multi-level fantasy sports contests…

7,001,279 - Systems and methods for providing multiple user support for shared user equipment in a fantasy sports contest application.

7,548,242 - Systems and methods for integrating graphic animation technologies in fantasy sports contest applications.

Old School Vs. CoronadoIP Search Lesson Plan

2010-09-19T09:32:00.004-04:00

Old School Search Lesson Plan

How to effectively create a list of keywords for search engine research.

Duration: One hour to one hour and a half.

Could take significantly longer for complex, new, scientific or technical topics.

1. Develop synonyms for researching different topics.

2. Use a Thesaurus to identify synonyms as a strategy for generating keywords.

Learn how hypernyms and hyponyms can assist in broadening or narrowing a research focus.

(For the non-linguists among us hyponym is a term that denotes a subcategory of a more general class: “Chair” and “table” are hyponyms of “furniture." "Musical instrument" is a hypernym of "guitar" because musical instruments include guitars.)

3. Critically analyze search engine inquiries using a variety of keyword combinations. Develop search word matrix.

Explain that selecting the right keywords is a mandatory task before you start searching as part of an old school search strategy. Stress the need to use a Thesaurus, and to consider synonyms of search words if your searching has not yet led to useful research results. Stress the need to be patient in your quest for information.

CoronadoIP Search Engine Lesson Plan

Five minutes

Working by yourself practice you wrist motions using your mouse to make sure you are feeling flexible and ready to copy and paste.

Forget about all this synonym, hyponym, hypernym stuff. No need to deal with any of this since CoronadoIP already understands all the words and the concepts they represent.

Use reports of new scientific findings to execute searches.

Exercise: Go to the current issue of Nature Magazine. Copy the abstract from the article Direct visualization of secondary structures of F-actin by electron cryomicroscopy into the concept search box using your limbered up wrist.

Enter search.

Get back a list of all of the patents that are closest to the abstract. Start exploring if this is really a novel idea and how this might impact your research and grants.

Done.

Search the Way You Think.

Comment Has More Than 1000 Characters

2010-09-09T15:16:00.004-04:00

After posting the Calling Edward Tufte post I decided I should post comments directly on Director Kappos' public blog. So, I toned down my somewhat flip commentary here into a more respectful post and posted it in the comment section. Average word size in the English Language is 5 characters. Number of words in Director Kappos' Data Visualization Center and The Patents Dashboard post - approximately 1040. If you post comments larger than 1000 characters your feedback is marked as spam. I should have just posted a link back to Search The Way You Think.

So much for "We look forward to your feedback".

Calling Edward Tufte

2010-09-08T09:40:00.004-04:00

Calling Edward Tufte, when you get done fixing Recovery.Gov can you stop by at the Patent Office to fix their new Data Visualization Center and the Patents Dashboard? They really need an information visualization makeover if anyone is going to learn anything useful from this data.

Yesterday the Patent and Trademark Office released its new Data Visualization Center Patents Dashboard. (Here's the link in case USPTO website isn't being friendly to links. http://www.uspto.gov/dashboards/patents/main.dashxml.) The Commissioner's blog, Director's Forum: David Kappos' Public Blog, says, "This tool will give the public access to traditional measures of pendency as well as several new pendency tracking measures. We are also providing other important data covering USPTO patent operations in a convenient dashboard format." (Emphasis added...)

The most important message in the Director's post is that "...the patent backlog is stalling the delivery of innovative goods and services to the market while hindering economic growth and job creation....the current backlog of more than 700,000 applications may cost the US economy billions of dollars due to what is called "foregone innovation" -- commercial opportunities that fail to get off the ground because of long delays in necessary patent protection." In short, people simply give up and move on because they don't have the time or energy to wait around for USPTO to look at their applications. Things don't get built, companies don't get started, people don't get hired.

Ok, so what does this new Patents Dashboard do to assist the public at large and the IP community in particular in understanding what's going on at USPTO? Not much.

USPTO's new Patents Dashboard obfuscates, renders obscure, unclear or unintelligible, the urgent and critical patent pendency issues this data reveals. This unsophisticated and almost content free presentation of data does a disservice to the Examiner Corps and the inventors and tax payers who pay for all this and rely upon USPTO's decisions. The cartoon-like speedometers don't convey to the viewer either the complexity of issues that drive pendency or the economic urgency of solving the pendency problems. Little morsels of data are buried among animated speedometers objects complete with moving dials in an array of colors that have no meaning other than to offset the black background of the screen. So much screen real estate, so little data. Or as our Marine pals would say, very bad signal to noise ratios. So much for transparency.

The dial above shows that Traditional Total Pendency in months is 35.4 months. That's almost 3 years. This is an average. There are plenty of Art Units where the pendency is considerably longer. The speedometer is significantly larger than the data it presents. The data being conveyed is smaller than the dial's black background. But what's the context? What does this mean? When you scroll down to the text that accompanies the colorful dial what you learn is that pendency is actually going up for the last five months. Clearly the dial is moving in the wrong direction but who can tell by looking at it. This is alarming.

The choice of green to show the pendency information conveys the "all systems go - we're at the green light" message. The color selection has absolutely no meaning. What is the reason that the Fiscal Year Production speedometer is purple or that the Backlog is in Orange? Anyone who is serious about building a dashboard knows that color is an important visual cue to let users know what's going on. What's going on here is the use of color to distract from the data.

There is no way to look at the dial and understand how this measures up against previous performance or the goals USPTO has set as part of its strategic plan. The accompanying text for the Traditional Total Pendency speedometer says, "Our goal is to reduce Traditional Total Pendency to an average of 20 months by 2015." Where are these metrics incorporated into the presentation? What about some kind of visual indication of where the pendency is going relative to this goal? How about one of those Tufte sparklines that shows the history over a longer timeline to give the reader some indication of how USPTO is going to cut 15.4 months off the current pendency in just over 4 years? Here's a Back to the Future Question: When was the last time USPTO had a 20 month pendency anyway?

Then there is the whole issue of whether the visual representation matches the data. Here is a metaphor where improvements mean that the speedometer is going to look like its going slower while the bar charts that accompany them are going to show values declining. This is intuitively and cognitively hard to process. How does this give the viewer any sense of when things are improving? A very odd approach at information transfer.

And then there's the Patent Examiner dial. All in white except for the graphics that are all in black. Are these guys unworthy of a color or is the goal to present the grime statistics in black and white?

Here's what's troubling about this dial and the write up that accompanies it - there is absolutely no linkage between pendency and the number of patent examiners. Isn't the number of patent examiners a major issue for USPTO? USPTO recently issued a call to industry to have retired Examiners return and for skilled patent professionals to consider a career as an examiner. How does this link with the data they are presenting here? Doesn't this chart indicate that Examiners are bailing? How does this number match up against attrition? If every month USPTO adds 50 examiners but 75 leave, things are not good. The number of Examiners by itself doesn't indicate what's going on. How hard would it have been to have an indicator for the target number of examiners and measure the current count against the target. Let the user know what this number means vs. the goal.

Doesn't it make sense to show the number of examiners relative to the Technology Centers where the backlog is? How deep is the backlog relative to the workload of the examiners who are expert in the subject matter of the patent application? How does this shortage of Examiners reflect the availability of similar talent in the US? Are we running out of skilled chemical engineers or are the chemical engineers choosing to work somewhere else? Is the pendency tied to the Examiners who are available to examine the patents or is it tied to the complexity of the patent applications being submitted? How about the average number of claims by Art Unit? What about the average number of patent and non-patent prior art references? We know that Life Sciences patents are longer and have more unique words and concepts that the "average" patent (whatever that is these days.) We know that fear of being charged with inequitable conduct is causing some applicants to throw in the every conceivable reference. How does this behavior impact pendency? But can you learn anything about what's going on here from this "Dashboard"?

As they used to say in the old Wendy's commercials, "Where's the Beef"?

Aside from the typos in the content, the downloads that don't work, the ridiculous gauge metaphor, all of which is covered under the "this is a beta release" disclaimer, how much did this thing cost to build? Is this yet another part of the squandered IT budget? Did someone go out and buy a widget tool to put this thing together? How long has this been in the works? Who is supporting it - USPTO personnel or one of their contractors that just got slammed by OMB IT Dashboard? PTO might take a few lessons on effective use of dials on a dashboard by having a look at the OMB IT Dashboard.

Edward Tufte is teaching his one day Presenting Data and Information course in Arlington at the end of the month. USPTO's money would be well spent sending a few of their data visualization people to the course and then build something that conveys information rather than cartoon dials.

Perhaps Dr. Tufte can swing by and provide some guidance after the course is over.

Business Methods Monday Jargon Alert - "Asynchronous distribution of stage-based information"

2010-08-02T17:11:00.008-04:00

"Asynchronous distribution of stage-based information"

Patent Application 2006/0288266, "Asynchronous distribution of stage-based information in printed format" was filed on November 30, 2005. Its companion, Patent Application 2007/0005384, "Method of Managing Circulation of Items in Printed Format", was filed on November 21, 2005. A third patent application 2006/0284962, Inventory management or distribution of items in printed format is part of the same group. They all evolved from the same provisional patent application 60/691,071 filed June 16, 2005.

Consider a publisher who has a series of magazines, books, other hard copy information. Synchronous publication means all of the subscribers get the exact same magazine with the exact same content at the same time. Everyone gets the same issue of Sports Illustrated on the same day with the same content. The inventors refer to this as perfect synchronicity in the companion patent application, Method for Managing Circulation of Items in Printed Format. (Were the inventors Police fans?) Rather than having the magazines distributed according to the predetermined perfectly synchronous method of traditional publications, the inventors claim a method of asynchronous distribution of stage based information.

Claim 1 reads:

1. A method for distributing information, the method comprising:

defining a plurality of sequential stages of a process, each stage being independent of a particular point in a continuum of time, the stages being related to one another in a sequence of time;

preparing to print a plurality of editions for a publication in physical print media form, each edition including information content customized for a range of stages, each range including multiple ones of the plurality of sequential stages, each edition being distinct relative to the others of the plurality of editions;

printing multiple copies of each edition;

receiving, from each of a plurality of individuals, respective personal information relating to each individual, the personal information including information for determining which of the plurality of sequential stages applies to the individual relative to a date;

for a particular date, identifying a corresponding stage of the plurality of sequential stages that applies to at least one of the plurality of individuals; and

sending to the at least one of the plurality of individuals at least a respective one of the plurality of editions, said respective one of the plurality of editions including information content customized for a respective range of stages, the respective range of stages including the respective corresponding stage identified as applying to the respective individual for the particular date.

Here is where a little context adds to the clarity of the invention. The Assignee is BabyCenter, LLC. With BabyCenter in mind, asynchronous distribution of stage based information starts to make sense.

Having a baby involves a series of sequential stages.

Having a baby is independent of a particular point in time, instead each woman is somewhere in her own particular stage of the baby making process which is occurring at a particular time for her.

Sending out a baby publications works best when you can send a woman material that customized to her particular stage in the baby making process.

This means that the publisher will have a plurality of publications appropriate for each stage of the process. This is known as having many versions of a publication appropriate to a particular state in a process to the non-patent geeks among us.

The publisher will use personal information about the individual to determine which publication to distribute and when to do it. The publication date and the particular issue being distributed is asychronous.

Rather than sending everyone the August 1 edition of Baby Making Gazette at the same time each of the subscribers will get their own customized copy of Baby Making Gazette based on where they are in the process. (Stage based information.)

Very clever. But is it novel enough to be patentable?

Science of Life - Ayurveda

2010-06-13T11:29:00.009-04:00

We recently released our Life Sciences index which holds all of the concepts and ideas contained in over 800,000 US patents in the life sciences domain. While our index covers concepts beginning in the 70s right into the current century, I thought it might be interesting to take a look at a life sciences repository that covers discovers in life sciences over thousands of years -- the Science of Life - the Indian art and science of Ayurveda. Ayuh and Veda which literally mean Science of Life.

The Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR)'s Department of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homeopathy, part of the Indian Government, is compiling a massive database of of traditional medicines and ancient remedies that it wants to protect from being patented in other countries. The goal is to protect the collective traditional knowledge of India by making it available to patent examiners around the world in a way that is accessible and usable.

The Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) contains information on Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha, and Yoga. It contains over 1200 formulations including 500 representative Ayurveda formulations, 500 Unani formulations and 200 Siddha formulations all linked to the International Patent Classification system (IPC). It includes easy to understand information how the compounds are formulated, what the treatment is useful for and the dosage information. It also contains a list of prior art documents ad the dates of publication.

Information in the TKDL has been successfully used as prior art to force the withdrawal of patent applications using traditional formulations. The formulations sections contain the Title of the Traditional Knowledge Resource and "Knowledge Since" information which has entries with listings citing 1000 years. Now that's some prior art.

For those of you who are classification junkies the TKDL has identified approximately 200 subgroups on medicinal plants where they recommend the TKDL be linked to to aid patent examiners in looking for prior art that relates to India's traditional knowledge. To see the list click here.

Among their more recent achievements is documenting over 900 yoga poses to block entrepreneurs from getting yoga-related patents. Yoga has been around for over 6,000 years embodying both a physical and spiritual practice. Yoga has grown into a $250 billion industry.

This is not just trendy news from the world of Yoga. Not news from Lululemon, home of yoga inspired clothing for healthy living and whose stock is heading off the charts and not news from the Facebook group called Yoga Pants, with over 78,000 people who clicked like (my guess is mostly guys but I digress...) but the work of scholars, yoga gurus, and experts have been documenting over 900 yoga poses in ancient Sanskrit texts.

This is an awesome resource for researchers. We're going to use some of the text of the formulas in our Life Sciences index and see what comes up. We expect it will be an interesting intersection of digital life sciences and the digital science of life. Stay tuned.

Life Science Patents Are Different - The Word Count

2010-06-01T22:58:00.005-04:00

In the process of building our Life Sciences Index we learned a few things about why Life Sciences patents are different. They are different because of their content, the science, the inventions. But they are also different because of the way inventors describe their inventions, the complexity of the subject matter, the amount of new vocabulary created by inventors, and the convergence of science in the Life Sciences domain.

Here is a snap shot of some of what we learned:

The average non-life sciences patent contains 250 unique terms. Life science/Biotech patents average over 825 unique words in each patent.

The average non-life sciences patent has 10-20 columns of text. Life Science/Biotech patents have 40-80 columns.

Coronado Group's Life Sciences Index

2010-05-31T11:41:00.004-04:00

On May 14th, Coronado Group released its Life Sciences index, a state of the art conceptual and semantic search tool focused exclusively on the inventions and concepts in the life sciences domain. Search the entire patent database in less than a minute. Find the patents that contain concepts, not just words, that are closest to your life sciences question.

The concept space for the index is based on the concepts in over 800,000 patents covering the entire spectrum of life sciences concepts, inventions, technology, and innovation. The index lets you search across the entire full text database of patents issued since 1971 regardless of how the patent and its claims are classified. This provides searchers with deep dive access to life sciences scientific and technical information in all of the granted US patents rather than those searchable using traditional search techniques.

Entering gigabytes of text into the concept search box enabling searchers to use the content of entire patents or groups of patents to find and rank other patents based on how close the information in the search box is to the concepts in the patents in Coronado's index.

Because you can enter words up to 256 characters, researchers can copy and paste genome sequences into the search box to look for the presence of those strings with the text of granted patents.

Medical researchers can address scientific convergence by combining information from different domains to explore the boundaries of scientific confluence. The same techniques deliver search capabilities that address multi-modality clinical investigations and treatment approaches.

Coronado's deep dive search techniques lets searchers explore how techniques drawn from their work and knowledge appear in other domains. This let's you search outside your scientific comfort zone without having to translate complex scientific discoveries or investigative hunches into the keywords, Boolean strings, or the language of other specialties and subspecialties to execute a successful search.

The Life Sciences Index lets you Search the Way You Think. Please let us know if you'd like to take it for a test drive. It is amazing.

Business Methods Monday - The Patents Behind the News

2010-05-16T18:10:00.003-04:00

A recent article in the business journal section of our local newspaper (remember those?) discussed how businesses are using social media to stay in touch with and advertise to their customers. Many businesses are now using outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and various blogging options, in addition to more traditional marketing means such as web pages for the business, banner ads, newspaper ads, fliers, etc.

Like most articles of this kind, information on the patents underlying these innovative practices is lacking. I decided to use Cog IP to do a little investigation of patents in class 705 that might support this interaction between a business and its customers.

I started by using Cog IP to perform a concept search on the entire text of the article. The search returned many business methods patents classified in class 705. I reviewed these patents and selected 16 that represented electronic marketing, covering a range of topics including targeted advertising, wireless advertising, intelligent agents, and shopping assistance using handheld devices. Extracting the abstract, claims, and summary of the invention of each of these and inserting it back into the concept search along with the original article, a new, more highly refined search result set was obtained. Sixty-five (65) patents in the business methods class were obtained.

Let's take a look at a few of these.

Patent 7013290 "Personalized interactive digital catalog profiling" "provides a universal interactive and enhanced digital catalog server system for products, services and information." The system allows users "to anonymously and instantly catalog any item they view in a store or trade show, off a Web site or television program, or from a periodical or brochure . . . meaning they can personally acquire and manage relevant catalog information for later use and sharing." Information can be cataloged using smart phones, portable PCs, personal digital assistants (PDA), Internet-enabled set-top devices (ITV), card readers and scanners, standard landline telephones, portable scanners, and Internet-enabled game consoles. Users access these catalogs through a web-based interface for managing, profiling, sharing with peers, or for use in a web service. The system maintains the anonymity of users.

A business may want to provide expert information on its products or services to customers. Enter patent 6223165 "Method and apparatus to connect consumer to expert." This patent provides "a method of (or apparatus for) facilitating the delivery of advice to consumers using a server unit which can store and display the names and characteristics of experts and then rapidly assist in connecting the expert and consumer for real-time communication. The server can also have the ability to receive keywords from the consumer, match those keywords to one or more experts, and tell the consumer how to contact an expert." The system also provides for identification of compensation rates for each expert (claim 1), the expert's certification (claim 5), and a quality score provided by previous consumers (claim 7). The inventor was also awarded other patents related to this one (6523010, 6549889, 6546372, 6801899).

An early method of providing "Intelligent agents for electronic commerce" was patented in 6119101 which relates to gathering and analyzing market transaction data and using software agents to represent and to assist the activities of consumers and providers within a virtual marketplace. In this invention, "[c]onsumer personal agents conceal the identity of the consumer and are capable of creating decision agents . . . that shop for products and assist consumers in comparing and ranking products. Provider personal agents are capable of creating demand agents . . . that quantify demand and target specific consumers without learning the identity of the consumers. Based on data generated by the activities of the decision agents and on preference data maintained by consumer personal agents, provider personal agents can quantify current, historical, and future demand, simulate demand, and target specific consumers for advertising and other messages. Provider personal agents can cooperate with consumer personal agents to collect data about reasons for sales and lost sales and to offer consideration payments to consumers. Consumer personal agents can automatically reject unsolicited messages that do not satisfy the consumer's preferences."

This exercise points to the ability of latent semantic analysis (the driver of the concept search in Cog IP) to evaluate information and generate related results that can lead the analyst to a deeper understanding of a particular topic, field of research, or intelligence assessment (be it related to health, business, national security, or criminal justice, for example). Using an efficient toolset tailored to the problem at hand greatly reduces the time involved, and significantly increases the likelihood of finding the needle in the proverbial haystack.

Business Methods Monday - Overly Broad Is Not a Good Thing

2010-05-10T10:41:00.007-04:00

Business Method Monday - So, you think you have a Patent…Part 2.

Recently, a reader of the “Business Method Monday” Blog series posed a series of questions, one of which was, "why so many of the Patent Applications that are classified as business processes in Class 705 are rejected relative to other classes in the USPTO Classification system?" Arleen pointed out that at least a part of the issue is that most of the 705 art is generally a concept, which in most patent applications is referred to in the claims as a "method", versus being a “machine” or other physical object. Based on what Mike and I have observed, the process of describing what is unique about a “method” appears more difficult and as a result, is very poorly done by many applicants…or whoever was responsible for defining the unique aspects of the “method” on behalf of said applicant. In passing…if the "method" is a program that accomplishes the business “method” claimed, which is the case with most business methods in Class 705, then there are usually further claims covering the "system" or "apparatus" features that are unique and used to execute the “method” you have claimed.

There are some other significant factors for this high rejection rate that Mike and I have observed…

Overly Broad Language -- This one is all too common. There are a host of businesses, legal counsel and to a lesser extent inventors, that seem to belong the "use overly broad language school of application development. This faulty logic and advice seems to be directed at the belief that one should be vague about what it is that you are trying to patent and the claims are likewise vague by default...or the equally faulty logic that you should be a broad as possible about what you are claiming. In most cases, this approach results in claims and descriptions that are are rejected for not being specific enough. They fall short of clearly defining what is indeed unique about their "method". While there may be some detail regarding the invention mentioned elsewhere in the Abstract, Description, Figures and the reference to prior art that gives a hint of what might be unique, when that detail is not present in the claims it is usually a fatal mistake. A patent is issued based on what you have claimed that is indeed unique and it will be defended based on said claims.

What Did I Invent? -- In some patent applications it is pretty apparent that the author, who we assume and hope was not the inventor, doesn't understand what the invention is. The other option is that the author did not have the skills to clearly define in words what the invention is. In some cases, there was indication of the inventor's intent from the disclosed detail in the Abstract, Description, or Figures, but it was not claimed.

Been There Done That -- Then there are the patent applications that fall into the "already been done" category. These application should never have been pursued to start with, as a thorough prior art search would likely have found the prior art that invalidated the claimed subject matter. But then if you are an inventor and don't know how to do a good prior art search this can happen.

There are some very competent Examiners at the USPTO. Given the volume of work the Examiners are required to process odd are if the claims don't clearly define what is unique about your invention even if it is reinforced by the Abstract, Description, Figures and the references to prior art on which the claimed art builds, then the patent application is going to be rejected.

In my previous life with one of the largest holders of patents in the US, we used to just love the vague and broad patents...from our competitors that is. You would hear the phrase from our legal counsel team, "you could drive a truck through this"...and we could and did. The conversation with the patent holders who thought they had this or that covered with their vague or broad patent claims would go basically something like this..."Oh, I'm sorry. So you meant to say that…but you didn't."...and that was pretty much the gist of the conversation.

This needs to stressed and understood by businesses, legal counsel and the inventors involved in applying for a patent…

Define what is unique about your invention with reference to all prior art it is based on, where that is applicable, and then building on this prior art, clearly state all the unique aspects of your invention in the claims.

Where applicable, state all the possible applications of the art and the possible means of execution that you feel you want to protect. After all, you are filing for a patent to protect your invention, which means there is absolutely NO reason to be vague.

You cover "broad" by applying for additional patent applications, specifically covering each possible applications of the art and means of execution. Frequently that leads to addition patent applications and patents covering these applications and means of execution of your invention.

Post by Sean Henderson

Collaborative Work or Is It? - Business Method MondayFor this post, I'll investigate two examples of art that USPTO has reclassified into 705/300, Co

2010-05-02T21:51:00.003-04:00

For this post, I'll investigate two examples of art that USPTO has reclassified into 705/300, Collaborative creation of a product or a service. This is one of the new subclasses Sean touched on in his March 29, 2010 post.

As a refresher, art classified in 705/300 must be ". . . drawn to a computerized arrangement for initial conceptual development, through cooperation between plural parties, (e.g., brainstorming, idea development, etc.), of a commodity or of work that can be performed for another."

As of the day that I'm writing this (April 30), USPTO has not placed any issued patents into this class (in all likelihood because they are still reclassifying the patents that will eventually end up there), as shown by running a search in the USPTO Full Text and Image Database (search criterion CCL/705/300; alternatively, click on the 'P' icon adjacent to 705/300 in the Manual of Classification). Forty-one (41) applications have been placed here (using the 'P' icon link).

Application 20100094761, "Method for User Driven Product Design and Marketing", is for collaborative product development using ad-hoc user groups. Claim 1 provides for ". . . selecting a product theme as a request for proposals to a plurality of individuals enabling said individuals to edit some, all, or none of said submissions and submit the resulting product as a new product submission . . ." This is a good example of the art defined by the definition summarized above. Dependent claim 3 additionally emphasizes collaboration in product theme selection ". . . to be conducted in any manner by some plurality of individuals including an unrelated third party, authors of said request for proposals, and the plurality of individuals responding to the request for proposals."

Application 20070239464, "Networked System and Method for Formulating, Processing and Managing Challenges and Solutions", provides for formulating, processing and managing challenges and solutions, and has been classified by USPTO as 705/300, with no cross-reference classifications. This application appears to be a good example of conflicts in the new 705/300-348 portion of the business methods schedule with subclasses higher in the schedule. Both Sean & I alluded to these conflicts in our recently completed 5-part series.

Claim 1 of this application allows a user ". . . to select whether to create a new challenge or work with an existing challenge that has previously been stored . . ." So far, so good -- this appears to be captured by the 705/300 definition. However, reading further in the claim, a series of interface prompts are provided to the user, one of those prompts being " . . . a resources required prompt . . .", and another being ". . . a potential available resources prompt . . ." The claim concludes by ". . . receiving user input in response to the prompts . . . " The resources referred to are defined in paragraph 28 of the Summary of the Invention as ". . . human resources, equipments, laboratory, computer processing, storage capacity, or other resources likely to be required to address the challenge." These resources, and their allocation as defined in claim 1, are clearly captured by 705/8 Allocating resources or scheduling for an administrative function, which is defined as ". . . the distribution of resources or for scheduling in a business or commercial environment." Thus, this application should have been placed by USPTO in 705/8, with a cross-reference to 705/300.

Conflicts within schedules subject to reclassification projects will continue until the USPTO takes a more comprehensive approach to reviewing entire class schedules with a goal of eliminating internal conflicts, and ensures adequate and accurate communication among all the parties involved (project managers, examiners and classification staff across all the affected General Art Units, contracting officers, and contractors). Inventors and assignees assume the risk that their inventions will not be examined against the proper art.

Today's post is by Mike Bowman.

Business Methods Monday - Digital Rights

2010-04-28T18:06:00.003-04:00

Business Methods Monday: Part 5, Class 705 Schedule Changes, Classification Order 1892

This installment to “Business Methods Monday” is part 5 of a 5 part series covering changes to Class 705 under Classification Order 1892. As noted previously, this revised Schedule was inserted by the USPTO between Subclass 705/45 and 705/400, with the exception of Digital Rights Management, 705/901-912, which is for cross-reference Discretionary classification listings only and under discussed here. This section of the Schedule is included below for reference. As a reminder, anything classified in Class 705 must involve apparatus or method applied to data processing operations applied to some type of business processes.

For the complete Schedule and Definitions for 300 through 348, use this link to get to the Classification Order. http://www.uspto.gov/patents/resources/classification/orders/1892.pdf. As the USPTO has now updated their website Classification Main Menu, you can access the complete Class 705 Schedule and Definitions, which includes the 300 through 348 arrays from the Classification Order by use of this link. http://www.uspto.gov/web/patents/classification/uspc705/sched705.htm.

901 DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT

902 . Licensing digital content

903 .. Adding plural layer of rights or limitations by other than the original producer

904 . Usage protection of distributed files

905 .. Hardware usage protection

906 .. Requiring a supplemental attachment or input (e.g., dongle, etc.) to open

907 ... Specific computer ID (e.g., serial number, configuration, etc.)

908 .. Software or content usage protection

909 .. Usage charge determination

910 ... Including third party for collecting or distributing payment (e.g., clearing house, etc.)

911 . Copy protection or prevention

912 .. Having origin or program ID

First, from the “Handbook of Classification”, a Discretionary classification is considered “secondary classifications based on non-inventive, but otherwise valuable, information are discretionary”. This is generally based on detail that is not directly claimed, but is disclosed in the Abstract, Description, Figures, etc., though I have seen cases where Discretionary classification is wisely applied for methodology, claim or otherwise, that one versed in the art knows is being employed and the listing will therefore be of value for future search purposes.

901 “DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT” is defined as “Subject matter drawn to a system of information technology components (hardware and software) and services designed to distribute and control the rights to intellectual property created or reproduced in digital form for distribution online or via other digital media, in conjunction with corresponding law, policy, and business models.” Everything below this is finer detail applied to the distribution, protection of rights and methodology associated with revenue from the distribution. I am only going to hit the high points for this as the Definitions are pretty clear regarding content.

902 “Licensing digital content”, 904 “Usage protection of distributed files” covers various methodologies used to ensure that a user has been granted usage rights or means limiting access to specific users or devices by means of a required license key. Examples of this would be a license key for use of software, a key assigned to a server that is unique to a remote user allowing use of specific software or data when the user or the user’s device provided the key. In the case of the latter, this could be a key assigned to a removable device, see 906, which allows access to licensed software by the system the removable device is plugged into. In any of these cases, this could be for a determined time period. 909 and 910 provide for means for calculation charges for the data or software usage and means for distribution of the funds collected, here by a third party on behalf of the to the data or software owner. In 911” Copy protection or prevention”, this is means for limiting the number of times data can be copied.

As noted by both Mike and myself, there are serious Classification Order 1892 conflicts with subject matter higher in the 705 Schedule, most notably with 705/7 and 705/8. The USPTO “Handbook of Classification” specifies that a Claim is classified in the first occurring Subclass that accepts the Claimed subject matter at least in part or in whole. As noted previously, the conflicts with both 705/7 and 705/8 were pointed out during the Classification Order 1892 project to the USPTO, and again in relationship to another 705 Classification Order project, which as yet, has not been published.

For the record, the USPTO Examiners consider subject matter that belongs in 705/7 to be evaluation of business operations, i.e., research or analysis, which is applied to management, planning, organizing, directing, decision making or controlling of an enterprise. 705/8 subject matter is considered any of those operations of 705/7 that are further applied to business resource planning, scheduling, allocation, distribute or routing. Resources of a business are any asset or commodity used by or made by a business, such as staff including contracted staff, business capital and intellectual property such as patents, trademarks, and trade secrets, then hard assets, such as computers, servers, printers, office supplies, manufacturing tooling, inventory goods, inventory or product distribution systems, transportation assets, and finally, the manufactured products or services of a business. As noted in an earlier Blog, the above is based on direct conversations with various Class 705 Examiners regarding what they consider 705/7 and 705/8 subject matter, which is backed up by USPTO Patents and Applications classification in 705/7 and 705/8. The conflicts noted with both 705/7 and 705/8 were pointed out during the Classification Order 1892 project to the USPTO, and later still, in relationship to another 705 Classification Order project, which as noted, has not been published.

For the most of the subject matter Mike and I have discuss in the 300 through 348 arrays, the Primary or Original classification will stop somewhere in the 705/7 array. If there is subject matter that additionally claims detail in the 300 through 348 arrays, the applicable Subclass can only be listed as a Discretionary classification listing, assuming one does not ignore the USPTO’s own “Handbook of Classification” rules.

What needs to happen to fix the conflicts we have noted?

Well, at some point in time, the USPTO needs to restructure the entire Class 705 Schedule as a whole. According to the “Handbook of Classification”, the requirement is that; “subclasses are arranged from top-to-bottom in order of decreasing complexity and comprehensiveness”. That is not presently the case with the Class 705 Schedule as it exists. As the USPTO is operating in the red just like the rest of the US government, it is anyone’s guess as to when this may happen, if ever.

A piecemeal process is fine, the best case being starting with the proper top-to-bottom order of decreasing complexity and comprehensiveness in the Schedule to begin with. If that is hopefully the case, and even if it is not, procedurally you must understand the entire existing Class Schedule and each of the existing Subclass Definitions for allowed subject matter, either higher or lower in the Class that is not a part of the specific Classification Order project. If conflicts exist with any existing Subclass Definitions, the Classification Order Subclass and Definition under consideration must be revised, so that the conflict does not exist, and barring that, the considered subject matter is just flat out not allowed under the Classification Order. While undesirable for obvious reasons, if there are multiple Classification Order projects are underway within the same Class, then everyone on each of these projects must be in communication with one another and in complete agreement that there are no Subclass subject matter conflicts relative to each of the in-process Classification Order projects relative to any proposed Subclasses and Definitions and existing Subclass Definitions. Procedurally, when multiple Classification Order projects are in-process for a Class, the individual USPTO project managers for each project are responsible for oversight adherence to procedures, QA processes and required communication.

While the internal business procedures do actually exist in the USPTO for Classification Orders, Class Schedule structure, and classification based on claimed subject matter, there is also evidence of that there is no consistent adherence to, or enforcement of these internal business procedures, which is based in the condition of various Classes and further based on actual Patents and Patent Applications classifications Mike and I have reviewed and reclassified in this and other Classification Order projects. Documents appear to be placed wherever one seems to want them to be placed, subject matter not withstanding. The issues of database integrity and search-ability are obvious; documents that should be searched in the Patent Application review process are not where the claimed subject matter collection of prior art actually resides in the various Class Schedules. I have seen multiple cases where the Examiner never searched the Subclass arrays where the clearly claimed subject matter exist, and that is based on review of the Examiner’s published search history data. Aside from the latter calling into serious question the validity of the issued Patent, which was also misclassified, it compounds the problem for the next Examiner’s doing future examination reviews and searches.

Mike and I hope that those following this Blog series come away with a better understanding of Class 705 in general. Some of what has been presented should provoke some very serious thought for anyone involved in the process of applying for a Patent Application, and most particularly for those of you who hold an issued Patent or are involved in representing clients who hold an issued Patent.

Electrical Engineers

2010-04-21T00:17:00.002-04:00

Today I attended a conference on Intellectual Property at the Georgetown Law Center. One of the panelists was Commissioner Robert Stoll who is Commissioner of Patents at the Patent Office. During the discussion he told the assembled patent smart guys the following:

This year, as in other years, USPTO will hire 2% of the electrical engineers that graduate from college.

He also added that we'd also like electrical engineers to be electrical engineers and not just patent examiners.

That's a lot of electrical engineers.

Business Methods Monday - Documents, Communications, and Ratings

2010-04-19T00:01:00.000-04:00

This week, I'll discuss new business methods subclasses 705/342 through 348, that deal with business documentation, employee and customer communications, business or product ratings, and business modeling inventions. All of the subclasses we are discussing in this series require, as a fundamental element of the claimed disclosure, a "computerized arrangement".

You can view this section of the schedule in the USPTO Manual of Classification. This portion of the schedule is shown here:

342 . Business documentation

343 .. Service or product manual or catalogue

344 .. Publishing content to a subscriber of a service

345 . Employee communication administration

346 . Customer communication at a business location (e.g., providing

product or service information, consulting, etc.)

347 . Business establishment or product rating or recommendation

348 . Business modeling

Business Documentation and its two indented subclasses are found at 705/342--344. Business Documentation (705/342), per se, requires a computerized arrangement involving "....management of business documents or business document generation as a business function . . ." which must include a ". . . means for distribution, processing or the usage of the business data in a business environment." This latter requirement is re-emphasized in a clarifying note. Indented below Business documentation is subclass 705/343, Service or product manual or catalogue. This subclass covers disclosures that provide ". . . generation of documents used to describe the use or the features of a business service or product with a means for distribution or usage in a business environment." These documents are considered to be both hard copy and electronic. Also indented below Business documentation is subclass 705/344, Publishing content to a subscriber of a service. In this subclass, subject matter must be for ". . . generating, managing or brokering of on-line or hard copy documents, with means for distribution, access or usage by the clients of the business." This includes disclosures where documents may be published in response to a predetermined schedule, or as a result of

triggering events, according to the accompanying note. To be classified in any of these three subclasses, the invention must include a means for distribution or usage in a business environment.

Employee Communication Administration is now classified at 705/345. USPTO considers administering employee communication to be ". . . directing business activity information or instructions to agents of a business via the Intranet, Internet, World Wide Web, including wireless communications to business personnel"; agents are considered employees per an accompanying note. Also, ". . . communications to remote agents of the business, such as field service, sales, delivery or other personnel" are included here.

Customer Communication, subclass 705/346, is for Customer Communication at a business location (e.g., providing product or service information, consulting, etc.). Inventive content classified here is ". . . for communications directed to client in a place of business by means of a wired or a wireless network." See or search notes direct some disclosures to other class 705 subclasses: 705/7 for analytical content, 705/14.1 for a coupon or other incentive, 705/14.4 for advertising, 705/16 for effecting a transaction and determining the amount of a sale, or 705/26 for aspects related to electronic shopping.

Business Establishment or Product Rating or Recommendation is now included in subclass 705/347. To be classified here, art must include ". . . ranking or collecting reviews regarding business entities or the products or the services of business entities." Two important see or search notes direct disclosures including analysis of business processes or operations research to 705/7, or disclosures including on-line browsing or purchase of a product or service to 705/26.

Business Modeling is found at 705/348. This art is considered to be ". . . simulation of a business operation or a function; or a document." A see or search note directs inventions ". . including analysis of business processes or operations research" to 705/7. It will be interesting to see how this plays out. How can simulations "of a business operation or a function; or a document" be performed without analysis? It would seem that any art intended to be classified here would stop at 705/7 or its indented subclasses according to the rules of classification. Time will tell.

In next week's final installment of this series, Sean will take a look at digital rights management, which USPTO has added as a new cross-reference art collection at the bottom of the class 705 schedule.

Business Methods Monday is the work of Mike Bowman and Sean Henderson. Mr. Bowman and Mr. Henderson have probably read more business methods patents than anyone having reclassified them into the new class structure for USPTO.

Business Method Monday -- A Little Late

2010-04-14T07:15:00.003-04:00

Business Methods Monday: Part 3, Class 705 Schedule Changes, Classification Order 1892

This installment to “Business Methods Monday” is part 3 of a 5 part series covering changes to Class 705 under Classification Order 1892. As noted previously, this revised Schedule was inserted by the USPTO between Subclass 705/45 and 705/400, with the exception of Digital Rights Management, 705/901-912, which is for cross-reference Discretionary classification listings only, which will be discussed in a future installment. All of the 4,000 documents Mike and I reclassified for this project where originally classified as 705/1. As a reminder, anything classified in Class 705 must involve apparatus or method applied to data processing operations applied to some type of business processes.

Under discussion here are the Subclasses 326-328, 329 and 330-341. This section of the Schedule is included below for reference. For the complete Schedule and Definitions for 300 through 348, use this link to get to the Classification Order. http://www.uspto.gov/patents/resources/classification/orders/1892.pdf)

326 . Education administration or guidance

327 .. Education institution selection, admissions, or financial aid

328 .. Career enhancement or continuing education service

329 . Fundraising management

330 . Shipping

331 .. Overseas transaction

332 .. Special goods or handling procedure

333 .. Tracking

334 .. Choice of carrier

335 ... Pricing

336 .. Relationship between shipper or supplier and a carrier

337 .. Carrier internal procedure

338 ... Routing method

339 .. Central recipient pick-up

340 .. Return transaction

341 .. Historical data

Right from the start, there is serious 326 through 341 subject matter conflict with subject matter that is higher in the 705 Schedule. The USPTO “Handbook of Classification” specifies that a Claim is classified in the first occurring Subclass that accepts the Claimed subject matter at least in part or in whole. These are the classification rules that all Examiners and Classifiers are required to follow. The USPTO Examiners consider subject matter that belongs in 705/7 to be evaluation of business operations, i.e., research or analysis, which is applied to management, planning, organizing, directing, decision making or controlling of an enterprise. 705/8 subject matter is considered any of those operations of 705/7 that are further applied to business resource planning, scheduling, allocation, distribute or routing. Resources of a business are any asset or commodity used by or made by a business, such as staff including contracted staff, business capital and intellectual property such as patents, trademarks, and trade secrets, then hard assets, such as computers, servers, printers, office supplies, manufacturing tooling, inventory goods, inventory or product distribution systems, transportation assets, and finally, the manufactured products or services of a business. The above is based on direct conversations with various Class 705 Examiners regarding what they consider 705/7 and 705/8 subject matter, which is backed up by USPTO Patents and Applications classification in 705/7 and 705/8. The conflicts noted with both 705/7 and 705/8 were pointed out during the Classification Order 1892 project to the USPTO, and later still, in relationship to another 705 Classification Order project, which as yet, has not been published.

Based on the Definitions for required subject matter for the 326, 329 and 330 arrays, the operations also are clearly 705/7 analysis applied to management, planning, organizing, directing, or controlling of an enterprise and at times 705/8 demand driven resource distribution. Specifically in 326, conducting, organizing, or maintaining management functions, institution or course selection, assistance programs; in 329, developing, organizing or monitoring the organized activity of soliciting and collecting money; in 330, arrangement for the delivery of goods or items between parties, or for the monitoring of the status of that delivery. Shipping notably, clearly involves demand driven resource distribution, and the same can be said for resources in fund raising or various education programs.

The net of all this: For the subject matter under discussion here, the Primary or Original classification will stop somewhere in the 705/7 array, and if that subject matter additionally claims detail in the 326 through 341 arrays, these Subclass can only be listed as a Discretionary classification listing…short of outright ignoring the USPTO “Handbook of Classification” rules.

That said; let’s take a look at subject matter that can at least be classified as a Discretionary classification in the 326 through 341 arrays.

Subclass 326 “Education administration or guidance”, through 328, cover education institutions administrative operations. The Definition for subject matter entry in 326 reads, “Subject matter drawn to a computerized arrangement for (1) the business of conducting, organizing, or maintaining the management functions of an organization concerned with teaching , (2) the management of the process of institution or course selection, or (3) the management of assistance programs.”. Basically, this could cover all educational institution administrative operations, some of which will be resource management, such as assistance programs and course selection. This is further broken out in the 2 Dot indents:

327 “Education institution selection, admissions, or financial aid” associated with financial aid, which Claim dependent, must be considered for 705/8 resource distribution means, financial operations in 705/30 and 705/35.

328 “Career enhancement or continuing education service” deals with the institutions analysis related to continuing education services, including career changes and credits given for work experience.

Next is 329 “Fundraising Management”, which has been defined as “Subject matter drawn to a computerized arrangement for a system for developing, organizing or monitoring the organized activity of soliciting and collecting money for a nonprofit or political organization” which is first a 705/7 operational process, developing, organizing or monitoring the organized activity, which may claims financial resource allocation operations that fall into 705/8. Some can be in 705/30 and 705/35.

Subclass 330 “Shipping”, has been defined as “Subject matter drawn to a computerized arrangement for the delivery of goods or items between parties, or for the monitoring of the status of that delivery”. Again, this is subject matter that will stop in 705/7 array, most in 705/8 administrative arrangement for the delivery of goods or items between parties or scheduling for shipping goods or items between parties. NOTE: All the 2 Dot indents to 330 that follow must first include arrangement for the delivery of goods or items between parties, or for the monitoring of the status of that delivery, and also claim detail that is defined in a Subclass below:

331, “Overseas transaction”, covers shipping a resource internationally, and could include administrative operations for security, inspections and bounding procedures for shipped goods.

332, “Special goods or handling procedure”, covers any unique requirement for the resource being shipped, such as required environmental conditions during transit, shock prevention during transport, shipping time associated with product life cycle such as for foods, medical commodities, etc.

333, “Tracking”, which covers methodology for tracking shipped resources that are in-transit, by the carrier or by a client/recipient.

334 “Choice of carrier”, covers analysis applied to picking a specific carrier for shipping, which may be an internal process or a process done by the client/recipient, which moves to the 3 Dot indent 335 “Pricing” if price is claimed as a determining factor for the carrier choice.

336, “Relationship between shipper or supplier and a carrier”, which is defined as “…computerized arrangement directed at handling the transactions between a shipper or supplier of goods and the carrier who will deliver the goods” that are for the delivery of goods or items between parties or for the monitoring of the status of that delivery”. Note that 333 “Tracking” operations stop higher.

337 “Carrier internal procedure” for delivery of goods, which is very broad, with a 3 Dot indent, 338, “Routing method”, where the internal procedure for delivery of goods is applied to methodology for routing the resource being shipped.

339 “Central recipient pick-up” cover methods for shipping to a central location where the methodology further includes means for the recipient of the goods to pick up the shipped product.

340 “Return transaction” for processes of sending of received goods back to a supplier or manufacturer.

341 “Historical data”, that from the Definition is “…information collected in shipping transactions such as customer data, established routes, load history and cost information” that is applied to arrangement for the delivery of goods or tracking status of that delivery.

Mike Bowman will cover in Part 4 705/342-344, 345, 346, 347, 348, which cover management of business documents, business data distribution, subscriber document publication, employee and customer communications, means for business rating and business modeling. I will follow that up with Part 5, covering 705/901-912: Digital rights management.

Business Methods Monday is the work of Sean Henderson and Mike Bowman. The delay in posting this week's update is mine.

Stay tuned.

Business Method Monday -- Products, Social Networking, Cap & Trade and Wayfinding

2010-04-06T22:05:00.004-04:00

This week, I'll discuss new business methods subclasses 705/317 through 325, which deal with inventions in the areas of business or product certification, social networking, human resources, destination assistance within a business, and personal security. You can view this section of the schedule in Classification Order 1892. These schedule changes have not yet migrated to the online Manual of Classification on USPTO's web page. This portion of the schedule is shown here:

317 . Business or product certification or verification

318 .. Product, service, or business identity fraud

319 . Social networking

320 . Human resources

321 .. Employment or hiring

322 .. Benefits package

323 . Destination assistance within a business structure or complex

324 .. Building evacuation

325 . Personal security, identity, or safety

Business or product certification or verification. This new subclass, "705/317, covers inventions ". . . for documentation, data collection, processing or monitoring to ensure the veracity or factuality of the status of an entity's qualifications, either required or claimed by that entity in execution of a business requirement or legal process." A clarifying note brings in a very broad range of content:

* land use by an entity

* carbon credits, emissions, abatement

* product compliance

* clinical trials

* trade agreements

* licensing

* degree verification

* government test

* regulatory compliance

* continuing education requirements

* safety compliance

* documentation of legal proceedings, such as courtroom transcripts.

Other notes (termed "See or Search" notes) under this definition direct inventions ". . . including analysis of business processes or operations research" to subclass 705/7, or to subclass 705/311 ". . . for the management of the work performed by a lawyer for a client." Sean discussed this latter subclass last week.

Indented below 705/317 is 705/318, for Product, service, or business identity fraud. This subclass is ". . . for the analysis or detection of (1) illegitimate use of a product or service, misrepresentation of the authenticity of products or services, (2) approved sources of products or services, or (3) the coding or marking of product with data used for authentication." The use of the word "analysis" in this definition appears to conflict with the search note in the parent subclass which directs claimed disclosures of business process analysis to 705/7. Additional notes direct claimed disclosures for subsets of fraud prevention or detection elsewhere in the class 705 schedule.

Social networking has now been broken out as subclass 705/319. Claimed disclosures that manage ". . . interaction between individuals or entities who are connected by one or more common relations or interests" are to be classified here.

Human resources (705/320) is defined as ". . . keeping of records (e.g., benefits, etc.) of the departments or employees of an organization, or hiring of employees", with employee performance review or evaluation directed to 705/7 in a see or search note.

Indented below human resources are two subclasses. The first is 705/321 for Employment or hiring, which requires ". . . engaging the services of a person or persons for wages or other payment either directly or through a third party." The second is 705/322 for Benefits package, defined as the ". . . maintenance, regulation, or the monitoring of non-monetary employment compensation provided to employees by an organization (e.g., health insurance, leave, retirement, etc.)." Detailed aspects of health (or other) insurance, such as co-pay determination, is directed to 705/2 (Health care management (e.g., record management, ICDA billing)), while managing retirement fund portfolios is directed to 705/36 (Portfolio selection,

planning or analysis).

Destination assistance within a business structure or complex, subclass 705/323, requires ". . . a computerized arrangement for providing direction information at a business location or the creation of direction plan for a business location." Indented under this subclass is 705/324, Building evacuation, ". . . for the removal of people from a structure for protective purposes." A note incorporates subject matter which creates a removal plan for a location.

Personal security, identity, or safety is new subclass 705/325, the last area we'll cover this week. Claimed disclosures ". . . (1) ensuring the legal or uninterrupted enjoyment by a person of their life, their body, their health, or their reputation (e.g., TSA airport screening, public venue admission screening, etc., in order to bar an individual who may cause harm to another, etc.), (2) for the detection of illicit use of personal information, such as analysis or detection means for determining that a person or business entity is who they say they are, or (3) for protective measures or protocol to prevent injury" are captured here. Notes direct certain fraud detection methods elsewhere in the class 705 schedule.

Next week, Sean will discuss new class 705 subclasses covering business processes related to to education, fundraising, and shipping processes.

Why Patents Matter To Everyone –Breast Cancer Edition

2010-03-30T21:27:00.006-04:00

Two weekends ago when the Nor’easter hammered New York City, my husband and I were in New York for some family business. We wandered through the rain to meet some friends and have lunch and catch up. These are friends we’ve known since college with whom we can really talk about life and where it’s taken you. The real stories. Not the “everything is great” version of adulthood.

My friend is a breast cancer survivor. As breast cancer goes, she had a rough time. Tough surgeries and more of them than most women. A tough time with the chemo. Plus all the other stuff that goes along with being a breast cancer survivor – gaining weight, losing her hair, being tired, having chemo memory, the emotionally crushing personal and family emotional issues. She worked the whole time she was in treatment. She’s much tougher than me.

During the conversation we talked about pink ribbons, whether she was sick of seeing them and how the experience affected her family. Families who experience breast cancer have their own perspective on the healthcare system and breast cancer that the casual outside observer doesn’t have. She told me she was worried about her daughter. She mentioned that she had been tested for a particular gene mutation that is present in women with certain types of cancer. She is an Ashkenazi Jew. Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe heritage are more likely to have gene mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. There is a link between these mutations and breast cancer and ovarian cancer.

My friend was talking about how she had been tested and things turned out well for her. She was shocked about how expensive the test was. Her insurance paid for the test but now she and her husband needed to decide if they should have their daughter tested. He is Sephardic, a Jew of Meditaranean descent. That improves the odds that their daughter might not have the mutation. The test cost over $3,000.

We talked about the test and the cost. As an aside she said, “I don’t understand why this test costs so much?”

“Patents.” It’s all about the patents. I explained that Myraid Genetics sells the test for the presence of the genes that indicate a predisposition for breast cancer. The patents are on DNA sequences from the gene. Myriad and the Univeristy of Utah owned seven patents on its BRCAnalysis test. They had a corner on the market. Not only do they perform the test but there would be no second opinion because no one else could do the test without violating Myriad’s patents. She asked a simple question, “How can you patent something in the human body?

This led to the whole discussion on discovery versus invention; and fairness, and science. Anyway, it was pretty serious stuff for a Saturday brunch so we moved on.

Yesterday the court answered the question when Judge Robert Sweet wrote in his opinion that the Myriad patents covered part of the natural world and therefore did not qualify for patent protection. The isolated DNA that Myriad discovered was a product of nature. According to the ACLU over 20% of the human genome has been patented.

It remains to be seen how all this will end up. Myriad’s stock went down 5.5% today, another indication that the loss of patent protection can be market moving. But one of the things that we know for sure is that everyone needs to understand the role that patents and innovation play in their lives and how these inventions impact us. The Judge’s opinion is a good read on the topic. (PDF).

By the way, a major decision that impacts a huge chunk of the genome domain, personalized medicine, woman with breast cancer, and moves the stock price of Myriad 5.5% in a single day and none of the major commentators included the patent numbers in their reporting or commentary so here they are:

Class 705 Schedule Changes, Classification Order 1892 - Installment 1

2010-03-29T00:25:00.004-04:00

Mike Bowman has provided an introduction to the recent changes to Class 705 under Classification Order 1892, which added subclasses 705/300 through 348 and that were inserted by the USPTO between Subclass 705/45 and 705/400, with the exception of Digital Rights Management, 705/901-912, which is for cross-reference discretionary classification listings only and will be discussed in a future installment. For this particular project, Mike and I reclassified some 4,000 documents according to subject matter, which were originally classified as 705/1.

This is the first of a five (5) part series to describe the changes and some of the inventive content that may appear in this subclass array. This installment covers subclasses 300 through 316.

We have included the subclass section 300 through 316 that is under discussion below for reference. For the complete Schedule and Definition listing for 300 through 348, use this link to get to the Classification Order.

300 . Collaborative creation of a product or a service

301 . Workflow collaboration or project management

302 . Product or service warranty

303 . Product recall

304 . Customer service (i.e., after purchase)

305 . Product repair or maintenance administration

306 . Product appraisal

307 . Rental (i.e., leasing)

308 . Product recycling or disposal administration

309 . Alternate dispute resolution

310 . Intellectual property management

311 . Legal service

312 .. Estate planning

313 . Real estate

314 .. Property management

315 .. Land development

316 .. Closing

As a reminder, anything classified in Class 705 must involve apparatus or method applied to data processing operations for some type of business processes. Starting with 300 and 301, the subject matter covers collaborative operations such as methodology that involves product or service concept development that occurs between various parties or for that matter, various businesses. In the case of 301, it is project related collaborative activities, that not 705/8 resource related or 705/9 staff related task in a project.

The subclasses 302 through 306, and 308 can be considered services for clients that primarily occur after the sale of the product or the service that is being rendered, such as processes for administering a warranty, including product safety or defects recall. In 305, this is subject matter related to methodology for administering repairs of anything considered a product, in 306 any appraisal process for determining the remaining value of anything that is a commodity, which can be applied to the insurance, banking and real estate industry, just to name a few possible applications. Subclass 308, product recycling or disposal administration, is going to become huge, and will include methodology for processing waste, waste stream management, waste sorting and recycling. For example, battery reclamation and electronic component reclamation processes may be classified here.

Back tracking in the revised Schedule to 307, the Definition for 307 “Rental (i.e., leasing)” states this is “Subject matter drawn to a computerized arrangement for the creation or maintenance of a record keeping system for recording the allocation of the temporary use of commodities”.

There is a problem here. The USPTO “Handbook of Classification” specifies that a Claim is classified in the first occurring subclass that accepts the claimed subject matter at least in part or in whole. Record keeping of resource allocation, regardless of the resource being leased, is an administrative function for a resource that is being allocated. If properly classified, this subject matter will always stop first in 705/8, “Allocating resources or scheduling for an administrative function”, which based on the subject matter, means that 307 will at best only be a Discretionary classification listing.

310 relates to intellectual property rights management of copyrightable works, patented inventions, trademarks, trade secrets, etc…such as methodology involving licensing, royalties or other means for protecting intellectual property, which could include litigation methodology applied to property rights.

The coverage of 311 is very broad: “…computerized arrangement for work performed by a lawyer for a client”. There is one indent to 311, Subclass 312 for estate planning, for subject matter limited to legal arrangements that will be executed post-life subject matter, which claim dependent, may stop in higher in 705/30, 705/36R or 36T.

The 313 through 316 Subclass array cover real estate development, construction of buildings, buying and selling of land including natural resources, with additions breakouts for services applied to managing commercial, industrial or residential real estate property in 314, methods for increasing property value in 315, and methods applied to transfer of property ownership from one party to another in 316. A good deal of this collective subject matter must be read carefully for content that stops higher in the Schedule in 705/8, 705/30 and 705/35.

Mike Bowman with provide Part 2 of this 5 part series, which will cover a breakdown of 705/317-325, inventions in the areas of business or product certification, social networking, human resources, destination assistance within a business complex, and personal security.

My next installment, Part 3, will cover 705/326-328,329,330-341, covering new breakouts related to business process involving education, fundraising, and shipping processes.