From: terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C)
Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk,comp.unix.bsd,comp.os.mach,misc.int-property,alt.suit.att-bsdi,comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: Letter asking for help with Apple from the US VP
Date: 27 Sep 92 09:48:18 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Weber State University  (Ogden, UT)

In article <Bv7JI5.6s1@lerami.lerctr.org> merlin@lerami.lerctr.org (David Hayes) writes:
>While it is possible for a person of normal intelligence to do a patent
>search, I dispute your assertion that it is easy. It is also not cheap.
>You can work your way through the Patent & Trademark Office's files for
>free, but you must fly yourself to Washington to do so. Access by an
>online service is shockingly expensive.

Several years ago, I found myself wanting to patent a couple of things; if
it matters, they were a mechanism for thermal pumping a free electron laser
up to ~10e11 watts, an alternate multiplexing process for signals on a fiber
optic medium, and a method of improving the yield on fission reactions.

I found that several Universities in the area had full sets of abstracts for
patents available on Microfiche (the University of Utah is one).  An abstract
is generally sufficient to determine if a patent *might* conflict.

For questionable patents, you can send away for a full copy of the patent
from the patent office for a minimal fee (a couple dollars).

It is *not* beyond the realm of possibility to do a patent search yourself;
it's just a matter of what is more cost effective (my time, for instance, is
now worth a great deal more than it was several years ago).  If the number
of potentialy conflicting patents is large, it may cost less to fly to D.C.;
otherwise, you may wish to narrow the scope of the patent (or not; one can
get patents on unique derivations of other patents.  A potential user would
need to then license both patents).

A patent search using a lawyer in no way guarantees you a patent; only that
the lawyer believes that there is sufficient unique new or derivitive
information, and that there is a high probability that what you want to patent
has not already been patented.

Even if a patent has already been granted, there is still the potential for
you to claim "prior art".  The inventor of the laser, for instance, did not
initially hold the patent on the idea.  He actually built a laser (believing,
mistakenly, that "reduction to practice" was required... ie: a working model).
When he applied for a patent on it, he was informed that a patent had already
been issued.  He fought (and won) on the basis of dated lab notes showing
that he had originated the idea first.

So while it is not necessarily cheap in all cases (multiple conflicts and
prior art claims), it is relatively easy.  It does not require a flight to
D.C. (unless this happens to be more cost effective) nor does it require a
lawyer (the majority of the cost in most filings).


					Terry Lambert
					terry_lambert@npd.novell.com
					terry@icarus.weber.edu
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.
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