Re: potent patent problems

From: Robert Fitts <rfitts_at_consultronics.com>
Date: Mon 22 Jan 2001 13:15:46 -0500

I was interested in the recent questions about patents
in on-line advertising such as advertising pop ups, and
Amazon's one click patent. I'm not an attorney but I
have followed a few recent cases in the technology
sector. I won't name the companies involved but I will
tell you that I know one company that found themselves
in violation of a US Patent that in my opinion (and
several experts) was in clear violation of all Patent
criteria. Firstly, the Patent is for the way that
software displays some information. To me this is
clearly not patentable as patents are supposed to be
for inventions or processes that would not be a natural
or intuitive progress in technology as would be made by
the common person. In addition Patents are not supposed
to be given if their is evidence of prior art. In other
words companies are not supposed to be awarded patents
for ideas which have already been done by another
company or individual.

The case I followed was NOT inventive, was NOT an
original (in the trial several examples of prior art
was demonstrated), and was promoted to customers (i.e.
became public knowledge) before a patent application
was filed ( a no-no in patent law), etc.

In reality however the jury trial was as just and fair
as the O.J. Simpson trial. The first thing that the
lawyers for the patent holder did was have anyone with
expertise in technology thrown off the jury in case of
potential industry bias. In fact both companies
involved are were not known by anyone on the jury.

The trial took place in California where it seems that
US patents are held with esteem and priority over any
other legal processes. In the end around $1,000,000
went to the patent holder.

The advise of a patent and intellectual property
attorney friend of mine? Lie, cheat, steal, copy and do
whatever you can do to get patents. Patents are rarely
overturned, the patent office is ill equipped to do
proper research, and patent holders are almost always
the winners in jury trials.

I feel sorry for the people in the patent office. How
can they be expected to be leading edge experts on so
many technologies and so many company inventions.
Software is such a virtual (as opposed to physical)
thing. There are trillions of lines of software code
out there. How can any patent office person research
(let alone remember and assess) it all. The truth is
they can't.

I'm not an attorney, and what I have written may be
more opinion than truth, but I know one thing for sure,
its a tricky world out there.

Best Regards,

Robert Fitts
Vice President of Marketing & New Business Development

Consultronics
160 Drumlin Circle,
Concord, Ontario, Canada
L4K 3E5
Telephone: 1-905-738-3741
Mobile: 1-416-567-5405
Visit our WebSite: http://www.consultronics.com/





Received on Mon Jan 22 2001 - 12:15:46 CST