Source: http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2009/01/
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 22:16:15+00:00

Document:
In SÜD-CHEMIE, INC. v. MULTISORB TECHNOLOGIES, INC., the CAFC vacated and remanded a district court finding of obviousness on summary judgment.
softening temperatures, while incompatible materials have dissimilar softening points.
requires the use of compatible materials for those surfaces.
should preferably be at least 20°C higher than that of the inner laminate film.
microporous film that is compatible with the inner surface of the laminate film.
would not have been obvious to a person of skill in the art.
necessarily overcome a strong prima facie showing of obviousness, see Pfizer, Inc. v.
More plagiarism at SIU: in its anti-plagiarism policy!
Continuing its saga of ineptitude, Southern Illinois University [SIU] apparently plagiarized its anti-plagiarism policy from Indiana University.
Showing a degree of reciprocity, Pamela Freeman, director of the office of student ethics and anti-harassment at Indiana University-Bloomington is quoted: "I'm sure it's completely inadvertent."
One recalls that SIU's defense of plagiarism by its President, Glenn Poshard, was "inadvertent plagiarism."
Hollywood script-writers could not do better than this story, a reprise of the Gang that Couldn't Shoot Straight.
Rationalizations abound: "We think this is a non-story," said David West, director of government and media relations for Southern Illinois. "It hasn't become official yet. If there's a problem with the draft, we will correct it."
"The concept of a six-word summary of anything is catchy and popular, but it is not protectable by any of the intellectual property regimes," said McGill law professor Richard Gold, an intellectual property expert who was unaware of his university's dispute with Mr. Smith before he was contacted by the National Post.
"There is really no statutory mechanism to protect it, and for good reason. The first person to come up with the idea of having a restaurant can't prevent everyone else from opening a restaurant. We thrive on people copying ideas."
IPBiz notes the similarity to Harvard Business Review's "plagiarize with pride."
Arthur M. “Lain” Adkins, who serves as director of the University Press, told the Chronicle that R. Gerald Nelms, a recognized plagiarism expert and associate professor of English at SIUC, “most likely” wrote SIU’s version.
IPBiz notes the irony in a putative "recognized expert" on plagiarism plagiarizing a definition of plagiarism.
One surmises that SIU falls into the dope category.
Biden's plagiarism at Syracuse Law might be a different category.
Microsoft has charged former employee Miki Mullor with breach of contract, fraud, misappropriation of trade secrets and unjust enrichment related to Mullor's alleged theft of confidential documents unrelated to his job about technology that Microsoft offers to computer makers. The information in question allows end users to forego the Windows operating system activation process on PCs that come preloaded with the Windows software.
While Mullor was employed by Microsoft, Mullor's company, Ancora, filed a patent infringement suit accusing customers of Microsoft of infringing on a patent related to this technology. The customers were Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Toshiba, but because the technology in question was provided by Microsoft, the PC makers asked Microsoft to defend them against the claims.
We ceased business operations at Ancora in 2005, and Microsoft was the first company to extend me an employment offer. I accepted... When I joined Microsoft, I notified them in writing of Ancora and my patent in both my resume and in my employment agreement. In its complaint against me, Microsoft withheld the portions of these key documents that show this.
In June 2008, my company Ancora filed a patent infringement lawsuit against HP, Dell and Toshiba in the federal court in Los Angeles. Microsoft fired me for trying to protect my own invention --- an invention I told them about before they ever hired me... Recently, Microsoft filed a retaliation suit against me personally in Seattle. Microsoft accuses me of lying, deceit, fraud and misappropriation.
These are shameful, dishonest attacks on my character by Microsoft – the company that stole my idea in the first place. Their attacks are untrue, and they hurt me and my family. Microsoft basically admits stealing my idea in the complaint they filed because they are asking for a license to my patent. Microsoft would only need a license to my patent if they were infringing it in the first place. My patent case in Los Angeles has been going on for several months now with substantial progress. Clearly, Microsoft and the PC OEMs realized that they have no defense on the merits of the patent case.
**UPDATE. On 17 Nov 09, Mr. Mullor notified IPBiz that "the case between Microsoft and Mullor/Ancora has been resolved."
Hmm, remember when Stanford released rights (pursuant to Bayh-Dole) to Madey, and Madey later sued Duke? And Duke lost.
The ChemE prof claims that the University of Missouri has a faulty process for deciding how to waive its legal rights to inventions deemed to lack the potential to make money. Remember Rutgers, San Filippo, and due process?
letter, Russell Jones Jr. to Suppes: "Your continued refusal to comply with the university's requests, its rules and the rulings of the university's Patent Committee has left (us) with no choice but to pursue its rights in court."
Suppes: "The university has exercised incredible neglect in the handling of invention disclosures. The MU tech transfer program is totally broken and basically beyond repair."
Scott Uhlmann, director of intellectual property administration for MU, attributes that decline to a technology transfer funding boost at the start of the decade that led to significantly more patents — and a concurrent drop in requests for waivers.
Christopher Fender, acting director of MU's Office of Technology Management and Industrial Relations, said it's in MU's best interest to help researchers bring their science to the marketplace.
A power supply for a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle consisting of a battery pack capable of providing a power output between 20 and 1000 kW, a fuel cell capable of providing a power output between 0.2 and 20 kW, a hydrogen fuel tank with a rated capacity rated in miles of travel at an average city fuel economy rating where the rated capacity in miles is equal to between 4.5 and 18 times the fuel cell maximum power rating in kW, and a control means that utilizes the power output of the battery pack to provide the high power needs of the vehicle and uses the fuel cell as a battery charger to charge the battery pack.
There is no mention of federal support.
In a process for the production of phase change material (PCM) chemicals wherein a reactant is reacted in a reaction mixture to yield a PCM chemical, the improvement which comprises the steps of carrying out said reaction in a reactor generating a reactor output stream, cooling said reactor output stream generating a stream containing solid reactor product suspended in liquid reactor product, separating the solid product from the liquid product generating a concentrated solid product and a mostly liquid product, recirculating either the concentrated solid product or the mostly liquid product as a recirculated chemical, and reacting the recirculated chemical in a reversible reaction.
which mentions Renee L. Kaswan and IP Advocate, Stephen F. Badylak, and Petr Taborsky.
In "Non-copyists," the PatentHawk blog discusses the recent paper by Lemley and Cotropia titled: "Copying in Patent Law."
It's unfortunate not knowing about patent copying only because knowing could engender even woollier thinking, and an even more theoretical paper, than Cotropia and Lemley were able to write this round. But not knowing doesn't stop the determined duo, who really want to make something of patent copying. Because without that, a paper about the topic would seem, well, senseless.
[Babel Boy]: Speaking of idiocy: why do people keep citing Lemley? We would all be far better off if he were simply ignored. You see the sort of mess Moore's online fame has led to.
[Patent Hawk]: Whatever one may think of Mark Lemley's work product, give him credit for prolifically creating work product, much of it, at the least, thought provoking.
Did Mark Lemley name Gary Boone as the inventor of the integrated circuit? . Note that the prolific work containing that error ("Patenting Nanotechnology") thanked Chris Cotropia, Bhaven Sampat, and Michael Martin. How "thought provoking" are flagrant historical errors ?
AFP reported: TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington announced Wednesday [Jan. 28] he is taking a break from writing for his influential technology blog after being spat on at a conference and getting death threats.
AFP also stated: Arrington, a former lawyer who has been cited as one of the most influential voices in Silicon Valley by several leading US publications, also said that last year, "an off balance individual threatened to kill me and my family."
In this paper, we show that there are important differences across patent examiners at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Of!ce (USPTO), and that these relate to the most important decision made by the USPTO: whether or not to grant a patent. We find that more experienced examiners, and those who systematically cite less prior art, are more likely to grant patent applications. These results are not encouraging as a matter of public policy. But they do point to human resource policies as potentially important levers in patent system reform.
The 271blog did not note Lemley's poor track record in the patent grant rate area, as shown by Lemley's reversal of his position on Robert Clarke's analysis which appeared in Lemley's rubber stamp SSRN piece, and flat-out contradicted what Lemley said in "Ending Abuse..." . Sampat was a co-author on rubber stamp, too.
Rambis Chu, a physics professor at Texas Southern University, is accused of copying a proposal written several years earlier by John Miller, a physics professor at the University of Houston. Chu's proposal was submitted to the U.S. Army Research Laboratory. Chu got tenure shortly before the alleged plagiarism was discovered.
IPBiz notes that a plotline in a Law & Order episode more than 10 years ago ("Big Bang") involved the stealing of a grant proposal (on proton lifetime). Nothing new here.
AP confused on PCT process?
An AP report concludes with the sentence: For a flat fee of 1,330 Swiss francs ($1,166) companies can file a request for patent protection in any or all of the 139 countries that have subscribed to the U.N.'s Patent Cooperation Treaty, avoiding the need to make individual filings in each country.
IPBiz suggests it wise to make one's national stage filings by the 30 (or 31) month deadline, if one seeks patent protection.
The AP was otherwise talking about a decline in the rate of PCT filings: Almost 164,000 international patents [sic: applications] were filed through the World Intellectual Property Organization [WIPO] last year, about 2.4 percent more than in 2007.
During the previous three years international filings grew by an average of 9.3 percent.
In recent months the [Consumer Confidence] index has hit its lowest troughs since it began in 1967, and is hovering at less than half its level of January 2007, when it was 87.3.
TMC also noted Huawei was the top PCT filer: Huawei Technologies Co., a major telecommunications company based in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province in southern China, filed 1,737 international patent applications under WIPO's Patent Cooperation Treaty in the reporting year, followed by Japan's Panasonic Corp. with 1,729, the report said.
A slight change was made.
Nevertheless, cost-cutting there will be. Pfizer expects to achieve about $4 billion in "synergies" by 2012, enabling it to reduce the combined workforce of the two companies by 15%, or some 20,000 jobs. As part of those synergies, Pfizer announced Monday [26 Jan 09] that it will eliminate 8,000 jobs, 10% of its workforce. It is closing five of its 46 manufacturing plants.
Pfizer's take-over of Pharmacia was related to the ill-fated Celebrex. Pfizer's take-over of Warner-Lambert was related to Lipitor.
What happened to the guy who developed Lipitor?
The companies’ combined work force of 128,000 will shed 19,000 jobs. Pfizer will slash its stock dividend in half. And Pfizer is taking a $2.3 billion charge to settle a federal investigation over illegal off-label promotion of its former painkiller, Bextra.
Investors celebrated Mr. Kindler’s big day by sending Pfizer’s stock down more than 10 percent.
Michael Schultz of Message Infusion, LLC emailed, noting that the New York Law School and its Center for Patent Innovations (people behind Peer-to-Patent along with the USPTO) have just launched a new initiative with a focus similar to that of Article One.
Michael noted that Patently-O had written about this, which LBE already knew.
The Patently-O post began: The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Public Patent Foundation (PubPat) started the ball rolling with public interest challenges to patents via reexamination. IPBiz has written again and again about how PubPat, along with FTCR (now known as Consumer WatchDog), were completely blown out of the water on their ill-planned re-exam request of WARF's stem cell patents. PubPat's prior art was found not to be enabled, and the declarations were "conclusionary."
LBE did enjoy one comment at Patently-O: This will work about as well as Patent Busters . . . what, they went out of business because armchair searchers were tired of putting in hours worth of work for no return . . . they realized they could make more recycling cans rather than search for prior art . . .? Oh well, another (terrible) idea whose time never was. File this one under "picking up cans on Route 22" [inside Jersey joke] but not unrelated to the fate of the guy who discovered Lipitor.
Another Patently-O commenter wrote: The anticipated, and confirmed, failure to invalidate the patents was meant to rebut criticism of the quality of patent examination. Seems no one paid attention. Gee, remember that the awful Eolas patent never got invalidated, in spite of the awesome number of dollars invested by Microsoft. Further, it's easy for Quillen and Webster to talk about a 97% patent grant rate, but, on deeper inspection, that turned into pure fiction. Yes, the "patent quality" harpies do talk a lot, but no one does pay attention to the aftermath.
The PatentHawk blog was not buying into the new venture: While arguably a nice service to the patent community, this ploy will most likely prove inefficient, due to reliance on under-tooled non-searchers, and like its parent project, non-scalable.
The 271blog mentioned the program.
The peer-to-patent folks have demonstrated a knack for not understanding what prior art is.
The European WARF patents are basically a marketing ploy. Countries that are a member to the GATT-TRIPS prohibit patents relating to "diagnostic, therapeutic and surgical methods for the treatment of humans or animals." See Article 27. So obtaining or enforcing medical procedure patents in any GATT country is simply not worth the money it takes to obtain the patent.
A system is disclosed for converting energy from the electromagnetic quantum vacuum available at any point in the universe to usable energy in the form of heat, electricity, mechanical energy or other forms of power. By suppressing electromagnetic quantum vacuum energy at appropriate frequencies a change may be effected in the electron energy levels which will result in the emission or release of energy. Mode suppression of electromagnetic quantum vacuum radiation is known to take place in Casimir cavities. A Casimir cavity refers to any region in which electromagnetic modes are suppressed or restricted. When atoms enter into suitable micro Casimir cavities a decrease in the orbital energies of electrons in atoms will thus occur. Such energy will be captured in the claimed devices. Upon emergence form such micro Casimir cavities the atoms will be re-energized by the ambient electromagnetic quantum vacuum. In this way energy is extracted locally and replenished globally from and by the electromagnetic quantum vacuum. This process may be repeated an unlimited number of times. This process is also consistent with the conservation of energy in that all usable energy does come at the expense of the energy content of the electromagnetic quantum vacuum. Similar effects may be produced by acting upon molecular bonds. Devices are described in which gas is recycled through a multiplicity of Casimir cavities. The disclosed devices are scalable in size and energy output for applications ranging from replacements for small batteries to power plant sized generators of electricity.
A system for extracting and collecting electromagnetic radiation from the ambient surroundings, comprising: (a) a supply of fluid characterized by its ability to (i) take in electromagnetic radiation from the ambient surroundings and (ii) release at least some of said energy when the fluid is caused to pass into a Casimir cavity; (b) a first arrangement configured to collect at least some of the electromagnetic radiation released by said fluid; (c) a second arrangement including means defining a given path for containing said fluid along said path; (d) a third arrangement including a Casimir cavity positioned within said given path and cooperating with said second arrangement such that said fluid is caused to pass into and out of the cavity as the fluid is contained along said given path, said Casimir cavity being positioned in sufficient communication with the ambient surroundings and with said first arrangement so as to (i) cause said fluid containing electromagnetic energy taken from the ambient surroundings to release at least some of said energy to said first arrangement when the fluid passes into said cavity and (ii) to again take in electromagnetic energy from the ambient surroundings when the fluid passes out of said cavity.
Biofuel skepticism within Waltz's "Biotech’s Green Gold"
As Bill Clinton might say, that depends on what you mean by "commercial facility."
Near-term technologies may allow algae to produce up to 6,000 gallons of oil per acre per year (gal/ac/yr). "If you really push the limits, then maybe 10,000 gallons per acre," says Ron Pate, a researcher at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico. This figure could improve with advances in cultivation, species selection, breeding and genetic modification, but only to a certain extent. The laws of thermodynamics and the limits of photosynthetic efficiencies just won't allow it. "When you see 20,000 or beyond—that's total bologna," says Pate. "It isn't going to happen."
Valcent Products, a public company located in Vancouver, is experimenting with a range of algal species in enclosed bioreactors. Valcent CEO Glen Kertz says he can sell a barrel of algal oil for less than a barrel of crude oil and that his system has the potential to produce 100,000 gal/ac/yr.
"I said to him [Kertz], 'You are not doing anyone any favors by making absurd claims'," says Scripps' Mayfield. "That is five times the theoretical maximum energy from sunlight landing on an acre. It's physically impossible to do that." No outside experts have been allowed to validate the system yet, according to Kertz.
De Beers Fuel based its claims, in part, on an obsolete bioreactor it had bought from Cambridge, Massachusetts-based GreenFuel Technologies. "We were not careful about our prospective buyers," says Bob Metcalf, a partner at Polaris Venture Partners in Waltham and an investor in GreenFuel. "The South African company said they wanted to buy it for $300,000 and use it for demonstration. We stupidly agreed."
GreenFuel designs closed bioreactors that feed off industrial flue emissions and, in 2007, faced some setbacks. A pilot project failed, its bioreactors turned out to be twice as expensive as expected and the company had to fire nearly half its staff, according to Metcalf. For the failed pilot, the company had made the mistake of trying to scale-up a small test system by a factor of 100 all in one step, and it didn't work, he says. Some experts have also expressed skepticism about the oil yields GreenFuel has projected in the past, which have since been lowered, according to people familiar with the matter. GreenFuel spokespersons could not confirm the old projections.
GreenFuel faces the same challenges that most closed system operators face. Photobioreactors are more complex and more expensive than open ponds, and it's tough to make the economics work (Box 1). "Anyone working on closed photobioreactors has got a problem," says Benemann. "And there are dozens of these companies out there," he says. "Just like in agriculture, you have to keep it as simple as possible and as cheap as possible. You can't grow commodities in greenhouses and you can't grow algae in bioreactors."
See also Biofuels: The New Alchemy by Bryan Walsh.
not a barrier, to creating and deploying low-carbon technologies.
give away something that you do not own. IPRs provide that legal clarity and certainty.
agreements cannot be properly defined.
Of Tim Padgett's mention of "negligible greenhouse gases," the carbon-containing molecules of the jatropha, on combustion, will yield carbon dioxide, just like other carbon-containing fuels. Also, the fuel yield per acre of various algaes is well-above that of the jatropha.
The irrelevant observation about copying leads to the conclusion: It's overwhelmingly independent developers that are getting hit with patent lawsuits.
Yes, there's a Lemley in the woodpile.
The point of the patent system is to make information publicly available [make it patent, not latent] so people don't waste resources independently developing what's already been done. The patent system can punish re-discoverers of the wheel. People that re-do old work should be given incentives to do new work.
Lemley and Cotropia looked at about 200 recent patent infringement complaints, including cases where plaintiffs had prior business dealings with a defendant, or had trade secrets allegations along with their patent claims. They found only 11 percent contained even an allegation that the defendant had copied, either from the patent or from the plaintiff's commercial product.
CNET writes on 23 Jan 09: Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) reintroduced legislation this week that would start a 10-year pilot program to educate district judges on patent issues. Judges from courts that meet certain criteria would be able to opt into the program, which would provide funds for them to pursue educational opportunities such as patent seminars. The participating courts would also be assigned a clerk with expertise in patent law or the technical issues associated with patent cases. The bill authorizes $5 million a year to carry out the program.
"If, as a designer, you do something really, fundamentally, blockbuster correct, everybody looks at it and says, 'Of course! What other way would there be?' This is true even if the client has been staring, empty-handed and idea-free, at the problem for months or even years without a clue about solving it.... Most really breakthrough conceptual advances are opaque in foresight and transparent in hindsight. It is incredibly hard to see breakthroughs in design. You can be trained and prepared, spend hours studying the problem, and still not see the answer. Then someone else comes along and points out a key insight, and the vision clicks into place with the natural obviousness of the wheel. If you shout the solution from the rooftops, others will say, 'Of course the wheel is round! What other shape could it possibly be?' This makes it frustratingly hard to show off good design work."
During the earnings conference call [21 Jan 09], [Apple] hinted at possible legal action against Palm were the Pre to infringe on iPhone patents.
First of all, let's just start with saying that Apple's iPhone multi-touch patent is a formality. Like most of you know, a patent is required to protect an invention from being commercially exploited by competitors. In some cases, patented technology can be used under a license agreement, and in others, the inventors might not have any interest of spreading the technology around. Apple, which is constantly growing its distribution network for the iPhone, is likely of the latter kind. Why should they license their invention to others, if they already have a successful end-user product?
As for Apple's iPhone multi-touch patent specifically, it simply describes what makes the iPhone unique. Currently, we don't know whether the upcoming Palm Pre will actually offer something that violates Apple's patent. But we all remember Palm loosing another gesture battle back in the old days, when Xerox sued Palmsource for the way Graffiti worked. Graffiti 2 was eventually rolled out, based on CIC's Jot handwriting recognition software.
Gizmodo describes the "issues" between Apple and Palm as a "nuclear war", while Engadget talks about "two large companies, each loaded up with tons of patents and pending patents". Honestly, we can't think of a single Palm patent at the time of writing that is crucial to smartphones, and if there should be a "nuclear war", we think there'll only be one winner: Apple.
IPBiz notes that one must measure the Palm Pre against the claims of Apple's patent(s).
The patent we're referring to is #7,479,949, awarded on January 20 of this year. It has a list of 20 claims but as Prof. Wagner showed us, out of the 20, 17 are "dependent," which means they drill down more specifically into features of the invention/interface/device described in their parent claim. In our quick Patent Law 101 with Professor Wagner, we learned that to legally infringe upon a patent, you need to violate an entire independent claim, which means, if you rip off one of its dependents, you're OK, you just can't rip off all of them all together.
This, of course, is NOT TRUE. If the accused product falls within the scope of all elements of a dependent claim, THERE IS INFRINGEMENT. John Mahoney got it wrong.
wherein the one or more heuristics comprise: a vertical screen scrolling heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command rather than a two-dimensional screen translation command based on an angle of initial movement of a finger contact with respect to the touch screen display; a two-dimensional screen translation heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to the two-dimensional screen translation command rather than the one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command based on the angle of initial movement of the finger contact with respect to the touch screen display; and a next item heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items.
A computer-implemented method, comprising: at a computing device with a touch screen display, detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display; applying one or more heuristics to the one or more finger contacts to determine a command for the device; and processing the command; wherein the one or more heuristics comprise: a vertical screen scrolling heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command rather than a two-dimensional screen translation command based on an angle of initial movement of a finger contact with respect to the touch screen display; a two-dimensional screen translation heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to the two-dimensional screen translation command rather than the one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command based on the angle of initial movement of the finger contact with respect to the touch screen display; and a next item heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items.
This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/850,635, "Touch Screen Device, Method, and Graphical User Interface for Determining Commands by Applying Heuristics," filed Sep. 5, 2007, which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Nos. 60/937,991, "Touch Screen Device, Method, and Graphical User Interface for Determining Commands by Applying Heuristics," filed Jun. 29, 2007; 60/937,993, "Portable Multifunction Device," filed Jun. 29, 2007; 60/879,469, "Portable Multifunction Device," filed Jan. 8, 2007; 60/879,253, "Portable Multifunction Device," filed Jan. 7, 2007; and 60/824,769, "Portable Multifunction Device," filed Sep. 6, 2006. All of these applications are incorporated by referenced herein in their entirety.
This application is related to the following applications: (1) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/188,182, "Touch Pad For Handheld Device," filed Jul. 1, 2002; (2) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/722,948, "Touch Pad For Handheld Device," filed Nov. 25, 2003; (3) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/643,256, "Movable Touch Pad With Added Functionality," filed Aug. 18, 2003; (4) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/654,108, "Ambidextrous Mouse," filed Sep. 2, 2003; (5) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/840,862, "Multipoint Touchscreen," filed May 6, 2004; (6) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/903,964, "Gestures For Touch Sensitive Input Devices," filed Jul. 30, 2004; (7) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/038,590, "Mode-Based Graphical User Interfaces For Touch Sensitive Input Devices" filed Jan. 18, 2005; (8) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/057,050, "Display Actuator," filed Feb. 11, 2005; (9) U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/658,777, "Multi-Functional Hand-Held Device," filed Mar. 4, 2005; (10) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/367,749, "Multi-Functional Hand-Held Device," filed Mar. 3, 2006; and (11) U.S. patent application Ser. No. 29/281,695, "Icons, Graphical User Interfaces, and Animated Graphical User Interfaces For a Display Screen or Portion Thereof," filed Jun. 28, 2007. All of these applications are incorporated by reference herein in their entirety.
***Of images of "nuclear war" and MAD, a post on CMS Watch [IBM, Microsoft, and the patent mess - how to protect yourself] uses images that were used long ago.
CMS Watch--> If you're a little guy, though, there's no way you're going to enough patents to play the M.A.D. (mutual assured destruction) game, and you can count on Microsoft litigating you out of the market if you try to violate their intellectual property in any way.
TechCentral (2005)--> The tech companies often simply pass the ball down the field, pray, and stand willing to litigate. They have also developed some practical coping methods, such as filing for as many patents as possible to create bargaining chips. Then, because the big tech companies are all in the same situation, they engage in massive cross-licensing. As an alternative, they play the old cold war game of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). If a company plays hardball with its patent portfolio, others will respond in kind, so it is better not to start a war.
After several years of eliminating jobs that once totaled 3,600 at that company's [Warner-Lambert's] Ann Arbor, Mich., facility, Pfizer announced its closing in January 2007. Among those put out of work was Bob Sliskovic, a scientist credited with developing Lipitor.
High levels of blood cholesterol and blood lipids are conditions involved in the onset of arteriosclerosis. It is well known that inhibitors of HMG-CoA reductase are effective in lowering the level of blood plasma cholesterol, especially low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), in man (cf. M. S. Brown and J. L. Goldstein, New England Journal of Medicine, 305, No. 9, 515-517 (1981). It has now been established that lowering LDL-C levels affords protection from coronary heart disease (cf. Journal of the American Medical Association, 251, No. 3, 351-374 (1984).
Moreover, it is known that certain derivatives of mevalonic acid (3,5-dihydroxy-3-methylpentanoic acid) and the corresponding ring-closed lactone form, mevalonolactone, inhibit the biosynthesis of cholesterol (cf. F. M. Singer et al., Proc. Soc. Exper. Biol. Med., 102: 270 (1959) and F. H. Hulcher, Arch. Biochem. Biophys., 146: 422 (1971)).
U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,983,140; 4,049,495 and 4,137,322 disclose the fermentative production of a natural product, now called compactin, having an inhibitory effect on cholesterol biosynthesis. Compactin has been shown to have a complex structure which includes a mevalonolactone moiety (Brown et al., J. Chem. Soc. Perkin I (1976) 1165.
Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Inc. analyst Timothy Anderson predicted that Pfizer would cut 70 percent of Wyeth's current $10 billion budget for research and development, and for marketing and administrative expenses.
He based his estimates on an eventual sale price of $65 billion.
At the Wyeth Pharmaceuticals campus in Malvern yesterday, workers, most of whom declined to give their names, said they had heard almost nothing.
"It's just wait and see," one man said as he walked from one of the two red-brick-and-glass buildings to the parking lot. "There's very little information, so there is nothing to comment on." A woman said she viewed the news as positive because it offered opportunities to innovate.
Wyeth, based in Madison, N.J., completed a 7 percent reduction in its workforce late last year. Pfizer, based in New York, employs 83,400. The company has cut 15,000 jobs since January 2007 and is in the process of cutting more.
InsideHigherEd reported: In her announcement [of retirement on 20 Jan 09], Blandina (Bambi) Cárdenas made no direct reference to the plagiarism allegations. “The pressures of the last several months have seriously taxed my health and well-being and impaired my ability to lead the university with the intensity and focus I believe necessary. It is time for me to move on,” she said..
The plagiarism probe will NOT continue. Much was made of the "anonymous" charges, but the existence of plagiarism can be determined from the evidence, independent of the identity or motivations of the anonymous accuser. Another academic cop-out.
"Shifting strategies in patent law"
Topics in the Santa Clara symposium on Friday, Jan. 30, 2009 are defined by the sentence: A dramatic rise in filings with the International Trade Commission for patent infringement suits, an increased prevalence of Non-Practicing Entities, and frequent use of inequitable conduct as a defense to patent infringement have significantly affected the evolution of patent law today.
Reuters notes: Under the settlement, GeoPharma can commercially launch its generic product, with 6 months marketing co-exclusivity, on July 1, 2012, or earlier in certain circumstances.
AP noted of Lowery: The 87-year-old Methodist is considered the dean of the civil rights movement, helping lead the Montgomery bus boycotts in the 1950s and delivering a list of demands to Alabama Gov. George Wallace during the bloody Selma-Montgomery March in 1965.
God of our weary years, god of our silent tears, thou who has brought us thus far along the way, thou who has by thy might led us into the light, keep us forever in the path we pray, lest our feet stray from the places, our god, where we met thee, lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee.
Shadowed beneath thy hand, may we forever stand true to thee, oh God, and true to our native land.
We truly give thanks for the glorious experience we've shared this day.
We pray now, oh Lord, for your blessing upon thy servant Barack Obama, the 44th president of these United States, his family and his administration.
He has come to this high office at a low moment in the national, and indeed the global, fiscal climate. But because we know you got the whole world in your hands, we pray for not only our nation, but for the community of nations.
Our faith does not shrink though pressed by the flood of mortal ills.
For we know that, Lord, you are able and you're willing to work through faithful leadership to restore stability, mend our brokenness, heal our wounds and deliver us from the exploitation of the poor, of the least of these, and from favoritism toward the rich, the elite of these.
We thank you for the empowering of thy servant, our 44th president, to inspire our nation to believe that yes we can work together to achieve a more perfect union.
And while we have sown the seeds of greed -- the wind of greed and corruption -- and even as we reap the whirlwind of social and economic disruption, we seek forgiveness and we come in a spirit of unity and solidarity to commit our support to our president by our willingness to make sacrifices, to respect your creation, to turn to each other and not on each other.
And now, Lord, in the complex arena of human relations, help us to make choices on the side of love, not hate; on the side of inclusion, not exclusion; tolerance, not intolerance.
And as we leave this mountain top, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques or wherever we seek your will.
Bless President Barack, first lady Michelle. Look over our little angelic Sasha and Malia.
We go now to walk together as children, pledging that we won't get weary in the difficult days ahead. We know you will not leave us alone.
With your hands of power and your heart of love, help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nations shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid, when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.
Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around . . .
. . . when yellow will be mellow . . .
. . . when the red man can get ahead, man; and when white will embrace what is right. Let all those who do justice and love mercy say Amen.
Drinks Business Review writes: The Procter & Gamble Company, or P&G, has reached a settlement with Kraft Foods regarding P&G patents to plastic packaging for roast and ground coffee.
Steve Jemison, P&G's chief legal officer, said: "We are delighted by the terms of this settlement and will not hesitate to do what it takes to continue to protect our intellectual property."
At the time the settlement was reached, J. M. Smucker owned Folgers: In November 2008, P&G completed the sale of its Folgers Coffee business to The JM Smucker Company.
If I'm right that, as I argued on Friday, there's a cultural gap between the patent bar and the technology industry on the subject of software patents, an interesting question is how we got them in the first place. After all, it wasn't that long ago that software was widely believed to be unpatentable, and major technology firms were hardly clamoring for patent protection. Peter Mennell, a Berkeley law professor who spoke at last Wednesday's Brookings patent conference had an interesting perspective on how this came about. He argues that the impetus for software patents came from patent attorneys within major software firms who spread the "gospel of patenting" within their companies. Not surprisingly, CEOs tend to delegate patent issues to their patent lawyers, and of course patent lawyers will tend to have more pro-patent views than their bosses. And so despite the fact that few technology executives were enthusiastic about patenting, the patent lawyers who worked for them pushed their firms in that direction. And of course, once some software firms started acquiring significant numbers of patents, it sparked the arms race that we've talked about here at Techdirt.
LBE once heard Menell speak at Temple, where Menell launched into the "transistor only for hearing aids" Lemley-ism.
Of this urban legend, see WHAT THE STORY OF THE INVENTION OF THE TRANSISTOR TEACHES US ABOUT 21ST CENTURY PATENT PRACTICE .
Also: Sometimes inventors do understand the significance of their invention! Menell's more recent comments, pushed by Lee, sound like an urban legend in the making.
The Patent Hawk blog has a post on an interview of Chief Judge Michel by Professor Doug Lichtman, once of the University of Chicago (now at UCLA). One needs to read the post.
We get 150 or so [petitions] a year. Half of them are in patent cases. And most of them are extremely weak. They don't carefully assess Supreme Court case law or Federal Circuit case law. They kind of conclusory fashion, they claim a conflict between case A and case B. They look like they're just going through the motions.
I'm surprised how unimaginative, unaggressive, shallow, most of the rehearing petitions are, and that very much handicaps the court.
Michel mentioned the examiner attrition problem at the USPTO: "Turnover is huge. For every 1,000 hired, you lose 600."
Of course, Lincoln freed no slaves. That's the myth. His Emancipation Proclamation was a military measure to demoralize and destabilize the rebellious South; it covered states he did not govern but did not apply in slaveholding states that remained under his jurisdiction.
Lincoln never recognized secession as legitimate and claimed until the end that the Union endured and that he was President of all the united states.
IPBiz notes that even Lincoln had formalisms to "re-admit" the states of the Confederacy. While more generous to those states than what would come after Lincoln's death, such plans are not consistent with the position that there was "no secession." How can one re-admit a state that never left? Further, if there was "no secession," why were not all Confederates convicted of treason? "How" the former Confederate states (and people therein) were treated was nuanced, and not necessarily self-consistent.
Pitts referenced an 1858 speech of Lincoln. One can also find interesting text in the speech better known to patent lawyers as the "fire of genius" speech. Therein, Lincoln spoke of "the invention of negroes (or our present mode of using them) in 1434." Lincoln dated the patent laws to 1624 in England.
Biden’s campaign speech included the lines: "I started thinking as I was coming over here, why is it that Joe Biden is the first in his family ever to go to a university? [Then pointing to his wife in the audience] Why is it that my wife who is sitting out there in the audience is the first in her family to ever go to college? Is it because our fathers and mothers were not bright? Is it because I'm the first Biden in a thousand generations to get a college and a graduate degree that I was smarter than the rest?"
FirstPost also did not include the famous "I'm smarter than you" line Biden used during the NH primary.
IPBIz does not know "where" to begin in the morass of false statements in IBM Piles on the Patents, Promises to Publish Plenty.
One has: In 2009, we should see somewhere in the vicinity of 3,000 of its patented technical inventions published, which means they become public property.
Dan Burger is one confused person.
IFI Patent Intelligence, regarded as a national leader in chemistry and biology patent information, said IBM took the top spot by a relatively wide margin in 2008, but is facing increased competition from such Asian companies as Samsung and Canon.
"It's important not to confuse quantity with quality," said Darlene Slaughter, general manager of IFI. "What's clear is that many of the world's largest companies are placing a higher priority on protecting their intellectual property. ... Securing patents may be even more important in a down economy, since it gives patent-holders an edge over their competitors."
IBM does not obtain many patents in the chem/bio area.
And just like the US Chamber of Commerce, what the ABA fails to do is explain why "any person selected to be Commissioner or Deputy Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks be a lawyer having experience in patent and trademark law". Surely the US patent and trademark systems are far too important to be a closed-shop in which only those who have practised IP law get to make vitally important decisions about how they should function. As I have said previously, the truth is that all Americans have a stake in the health and vitality of IP in their country. What works best for IP attorneys may not be what works best for the US as a whole. To restrict the top jobs in IP to just a section of American society would be counter-productive and could run the very real risk of excluding people with the vision and ability to bring real leadership to the USPTO at a time when IP has never been a more important business and political issue..
Of course, the "top" jobs at the USPTO are already restricted, sort of (remember the Margaret Peterlin case?). Is Joff's argument extendable to saying the surgeon general position should not be restricted to doctors?
erred as a matter of law in failing to hold the ’536 patent to have been obvious, we reverse the judgment.
success of the Cypher stent was due to the claimed polymer coating system.
identical purpose taught by the prior art.”); In re Corkill, 771 F.2d 1496, 1500 (Fed. Cir.
selected the zeolites of the claims from among ‘thousands’ of compounds”).
a predictable variation, § 103 likely bars its patentability.” KSR, 127 S. Ct. at 1740.
that claim 8 would have been obvious in view of Wolff.
Johnson & Johnson won another round against Boston Scientific Corp. in a long-running patent litigation over heart stents. The decision makes it more likely that Boston Scientific will have to make a $700 million payment to J&J.
Since 1997, the two companies have been locked in litigation over the popular medical devices, which are tiny scaffolds that prop open clogged arteries. J&J, which sold the first heart stents in the U.S., has patents on the basic devices and has won infringement suits against Boston Scientific.
But Boston Scientific had also won its own victories against J&J, concerning patents it holds on adding medicine to the outside of a stent to keep arteries from reclogging after a stent is implanted. Such coated stents have edged out older, bare stents.
IAM blog on Shane citing Bessen?
Something worth noting is that one of the sources that Shane cites with regard to his calculations of patent value is James Bessen. The same James Bessen who co-authored Patent Failure with Michael Meurer and argued that the US patent system was, in most cases, not delivering the benefits that it was originally designed for. It is ironic that his work is being used in an argument to keep things as they are, when Bessen himself strongly believes that fundamental change is needed.
public companies and dividing it by the total value of U.S. public companies.
between 0.8 and 1.0 percent of the value of those companies.
a low estimate. Shane is hoisting Bessen on his own petard.
companies to their patents than comes from this conservative estimate.
Did Joff Wild not read parts 2b and 2c?
The Innovation Alliance, a coalition of companies seeking to enhance America's innovation environment by improving the quality of patents and protecting the integrity of the U.S. patent system, today applauded the release of a new study that details the negative impact on the U.S. economy that would result from enactment of patent legislation similar to that considered in the last Congress.
The new study: "The Likely Adverse Effects of an Apportionment-Centric System of Patent Damages" is authored by Scott Shane, Ph.D., Professor of Economics at Case Western Reserve University. It was commissioned by the Manufacturing Alliance on Patent Policy.
1. Between 51,000 and 298,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs put at risk.
4. Reduction in R&D of between $33.9 billion and $66 billion per year.
Despite the significant impact a change in the current patent awards system would have on thousands of U.S. employers and millions of U.S. workers, it is believed that this is the first time the apportionment of damages issue has been studied and the impacts quantified.
"Given the state of our economy, it would be unwise to unnecessarily experiment with our patent system - putting jobs and investment in R&D at risk," said Taraneh Maghamé, Vice President, M&A and Government Relations, Tessera, Inc.
The link begins: The US could replace all its cars and trucks with electric cars powered by wind turbines taking up less than 3 square kilometres – in theory, at least.
Mark Jacobson noted: "Some options that have been proposed are just downright awful. Ethanol-based biofuels will actually cause more harm to human health, wildlife, water supply, and land use than current fossil fuels."
Jack Stripling noted that admitted plagiarist UF professor James Twitchell was suspended for five years without pay, and opted to retire.
A different outcome than with Glenn Poshard, plagiarist President of SIU.
Twitchell reported some instances of his plagiarism to department chair Pamela Gilbert, who did not then report them to misconduct officers at UF.
Of the comment below, IPBiz thought it had been pretty explicit about the Poshard "inadvertent plagiarism" business. Poshard did plagiarize, as that term is commonly understood, and should have suffered the consequences. Joe Biden did plagiarize in law school at Syracuse (copying five pages of a law review article), and got off very easily. Allison Routman copied fragments of four sentences and "walked the plank."
Biden is Vice-President elect and Poshard is still at SIU. The public does not deem plagiarism a "fatal" offense, at least for some people. Pamela Gilbert didn't seem bothered by plagiarism, either.
In passing, IPBiz ponders whether, by retiring, James Twitchell is permitted to collect his pension, which would likely be more than five years of "no salary."
“The world can withstand a few unprosecuted citation infractions,” Nelms wrote.
Stephen Satris, executive director of the Center for Academic Integrity at Clemson University, questioned whether that sends students a bad message.
Of --Adkins, who serves as director of the University Press, told the Chronicle that R. Gerald Nelms, a recognized plagiarism expert and associate professor of English at SIUC, “most likely” wrote SIU’s version. --, can Mr. Adkins, or anybody else, explain what makes Professor Nelms "a recognized plagiarism expert"? In his analysis of Poshard's Ph.D. thesis, Nelms missed obvious plagiarism (and poor thinking) at page 54 of the thesis. This failure does not suggest the work of an expert. Separately, it is true that plagiarism (copying without citing) is distinct from copyright infringement. For example, one can plagiarize Shakespeare without violating copyright. Also, in the US, copyright inheres once words are fixed in a tangible medium.
NJBiz reports: Biotechnology firm Advaxis Inc. of North Brunswick, New Jersey announced on Jan. 14 victory in a patent challenge in the European Patent Court in Munich, Germany, over its antigen, called Lovaxin C. In what it claimed is a final ruling that cannot be reversed in the European Union, the court reversed a patent challenge from Anza Therapeutics Inc., a biotechnology firm in Concord, Calif.
FDANews reported on 14 Jan 09: Medicis Pharmaceutical has received notice that Barr Laboratories has filed an ANDA to market a generic version of Medicis’ once-daily, oral acne treatment Solodyn — a drug that is the subject of a citizen petition.
With Pfizer's Lipitor facing generic competition on or about Nov. 30, 2011, Pfizer announced on 13 Jan 09 the lay-off of up to 800 research scientists and expects to reduce its research staff by 5 percent to 8 percent this year.
H-P has been focusing on "the quality of the patents that we seek, as opposed to the quantity," Mr. Light said. As a result, he added, H-P is seeking broad patents that relate directly to its main businesses, avoiding the costs of filing patents that may relate to more specific processes.
H-P's current strategy is a departure from the approach under former CEO Carly Fiorina, who tried to boost the company's profile as an innovator, said Rich Doherty, an analyst the The Envisioneering Group who follows patent filings. Mr. Hurd, in contrast, seems more focused on shorter-term financial results, he said. He also said H-P seems to be keeping secret certain innovations, especially in its services division, rather than filing patents. "They've turned the ratio of public patents to private proprietary advantage," he said.
Fiorina, who pushed "invention" at H-P was ousted for not innovating, and separately was involved in the H-P "pretexting" scandal.
In 2008, International Business Machines Corp. generated more U.S. patents than any other company, according to data from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office compiled by research firm IFI Patent Intelligence. IBM was granted 4,186 patents last year, IFI said, up from 3,125 in 2007. It was the 16th consecutive year that IBM led the patent pack.
However, author JUSTIN SCHECK did not mention some of the kinds of patents IBM obtains, such as the "airplane toilet queue" patent. Of more recent vintage, note IBM's US 7,475,086 (related to application Ser. No. 11/421,123), titled Method of automatically removing leading and trailing space characters from data being entered into a database system, first claim: A computer implemented method of automatically removing space characters from data being entered into a database system comprising: creating a table through which data is to be entered into the database system, the table having at least one column; indicating upon creation of the table whether leading and trailing space characters from data being entered into the at least one column are to be removed; enabling a user to issue an insert command in order to enter the data into the at least one column; determining, in response to receiving the insert command, whether there is an indication associated with the at least one column that leading and trailing space characters from the data being entered into the at least one column are to be removed, removing leading and trailing space characters from the data being entered into the at least one column if it is determined that there is an indication that leading and trailing space characters from the data being entered into the at least one column are to be removed; leaving leading and trailing space characters from the data being entered into the at least one column if it is determined that there is not an indication that leading and trailing space characters from the data being entered into the at least one column are to be removed; and entering the data into the at least one column.
Analysis of USPTO Continuing Education for Practitioners (CEP) Pilot Program.
Note: Monday, January 19, 2009, and Tuesday, January 20, 2009, are each a “Federal holiday within the District of Columbia.” See MPEP 710.05 and TMEP 308. Thus, any action or fee due on these days will be considered timely if the action is taken, or the fee paid, on the next succeeding business day on which the USPTO is open, that is, Wednesday, January 21, 2009.
this case, and the panel’s original opinion, which is reported at 499 F.3d 1365 (Fed. Cir.
The en banc order has a dissent written by Judge Moore, joined by Judges Newman and Rader.
58, we remand to the PTO to consider the § 101 question in the first instance.
by § 101.” Diamond v. Diehr, 450 U.S. 175, 188 (1981).
is no issue of fact, policy, or agency expertise.
patentable.” Rubber-Tip Pencil, 87 U.S. at 507 (emphasis added).
are not patentable even if they have practical application.
novel way of requiring and conducting arbitration and are unpatentable.
were directed to patentable subject matter.
this court’s decisions are producing.
suffices to provide Bilski’s “meaningful limits” under Section 101, we should be explicit.
which the appeal was taken.
Judge Newman notes: The panel broadly removes “business methods” from eligibility for patenting.
acted to bar Congress from granting letters patent in particular types of business.” Op.
patents on business method inventions, and that the Framers so intended.
the petition for rehearing en banc.
Article One Partners, LLC, a global community working to legitimize the validity of patents, today announced two new Patent Studies driven by litigation and dispute surrounding Worlds.com and JSA Technologies patents. Article One community members – called Advisors – have an opportunity to send in prior art evidence of validity or invalidity for both high profile patents, with the potential to earn up to U.S. $50,000 per study, in addition to premium profit sharing for active participation in the study and community.
"Patent disputes are moving to the courtroom in record numbers, with the cost of litigation typically passed along to the public – in this case impacting those who participate in virtual worlds and online gaming, and students using the campus ID card credit systems provided by their schools," said Cheryl Milone, founder of Article One Partners. "By presenting the patented information to our community for peer review, we focus a global effort upon the core issue of validity for the patents at issue. If a comprehensive search does not uncover prior art evidence, the patent is intrinsically strengthened. If evidence is discovered and presented, the market can take action to reduce unfair monopolies and overly broad patents. In both cases, resolution can be expedited."
An email noted: peer review is certainly a trend of interest with President Elect Obama lauding Peer-to-Patent's approach as what may be the answer for patent reform.
Squires testified in “Patent Reform: The Future of Innovation” (June 2007) on behalf of S.1145.
Squires founded Goldman Sachs' patent practice nine years ago, and he has been credited with giving the practice a more global focus. That includes taking on international issues such as branding and trademarks, operational and technology matters, and licensing transactions and due diligence. "John is a high-profile intellectual property lawyer who will play a vital part in one of the firm's major objectives, which is to continue to grow an international, full-service intellectual property practice," said Chadbourne & Parke Managing Partner Charles K. O'Neill.
Squires has also been involved in a number of public intellectual property initiatives. He has chaired the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association's intellectual property subcommittee since 2004, and co-authored an examination quality program with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He has also worked with Congress to bring about improvements in U.S. Patent law. Additionally, he has filed several amicus briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court as well as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.
Goldman Sachs owns a minority stake [in Santelisa Vale}, as does Brazil's development bank BNDESPar.
Parkway, completed misunderstood the Jersey landscape on stem cells.
Will IPlytics disrupt patent analytics?

References: v. 
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