Court Opinion

ID: 9479749
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:28:07.378181+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:47:15.404888
License: Public Domain

MAYER, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
In my view, the papers at issue here were sufficiently available to the public to qualify as “printed publications” within the meaning of 35 U.S.C. § 102(b). The nature and quality of the index in the Reed College chemistry department library are not determinative of whether the theses were publicly available. Neither Bayer nor Hall turned solely on the existence, absence, or character of an index. Indeed, the result in both cases is not inconsistent with the notion that merely shelving a single copy of a work in a publicly accessible area of a library is sufficient for publication under the statute. Earlier decisions of the Patent Office Board of Appeals, interpreting the predecessor to section 102(b), were to the same effect: shelving a thesis in a university library is alone sufficient to render it a “printed publication”. Gulliksen v. Halberg v. Edgerton v. Scott, 75 USPQ 252, 257 (Pat.Off.Bd.App.1937); Ex parte Hershberger, 96 USPQ 54, 56 (Pat.Off.Bd.App.1952).
Of course, the “shoebox” author index in this case is relevant to the question of publication. When considered together with the shelving of the theses in publicly accessible areas of the Reed College libraries, the presence of even this “noncus-tomary” index convinces me that these works were published as contemplated by the statute. But the existence or nature of an indexing system is only one factor to be considered in assessing the public availability of a work, In re Wyer, 655 F.2d 221, 226 (CCPA 1981); it is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for publication.