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Court Denies Smucker's PB&J Patent

lbmouse writes "The AP is reporting that on Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit rejected an effort by the Jelly & Jam maker to patent its process for making pocket peanut butter and jelly sandwiches." While the company was only trying to patent the "crimping process" used to create a specific type of mass market sandwich, they had also "...asked Albie's Foods of Gaylord, Mich., to stop producing ready-made PB&J sandwiches for a school district".

13 of 388 comments (clear)

  1. OMG! by Prophetic_Truth · · Score: 4, Funny

    There's only one way to celebrate...You know it..

    IT'S PEANUT BUTTER JELLY TIME!

    --
    time is a perception of a being's consciousness
    time is your 6th sense, the wierd ones are 7+
  2. Damn.. by shbazjinkens · · Score: 4, Funny

    There goes my chances of patenting the BLT.

  3. In a post 9/11 world... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    In a post 9/11 world, police arrest peanut butter and jelly.

    1. Re:In a post 9/11 world... by Mister+Transistor · · Score: 4, Funny

      In a post-9/11 world, peanut butter and jelly are weapons of mass digestion!

      Hmm... or...

      In an post-9/11 world, if the jelly of terrorism seeps through the bread of freedom, then the terrorists have already won!

      --
      -- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
  4. Trouble by soniCron88 · · Score: 5, Funny

    And you'd really get into trouble if you tried to make PB&J's with $2 bills...

  5. Slow news day... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    What's for lunch?

  6. With a name like Smucker's by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...it has to be fraud.

  7. next thing you know by b17bmbr · · Score: 4, Funny

    somebody will patent blow jobs, then my wife will have alegal excuse.

    --
    My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
  8. The article, with my analysis... by John+Seminal · · Score: 4, Funny
    Smucker's 2-ounce peanut butter and jelly pockets come in two flavors -- strawberry and grape -- and are enclosed without a crust using a crimping method that the Orrville, Ohio, company says is one of a kind and should be protected from duplication by federal law.

    One of a kind way to make PB&J sandwiches. I hate to tell these asshats, I was making PB and Strawberry sandwiches for ages. When I was younger I used to cut the edge of the bread off, but today I need the extra fiber.

    Maybe I should patent that I whipe my ass with the paper going upwards and not downwards. Who knows, maybe I am the only one who knows how to whipe an ass.

    Patent examiners at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office disagreed, saying the crimped edges are similar to making ravioli or a pie crust.

    Fuck, here comes Chef Boy-R-D and his patent lawyers. Someone tell that 90 year old woman she is no longer lawfully allowed to make her family dinner.

    Smucker asked Albie's Foods of Gaylord, Mich., to stop producing ready-made PB&J sandwiches for a school district, but the food manufacturer went to a federal judge in 2001 and then the patent office to invalidate Smucker's original patent. Albie's was "caught off guard, literally, because they didn't think you could patent a peanut butter and jelly sandwich," said the company's lawyer, Kevin Heinl.

    Can my girlfriend patent the blow job? She is damn good. She swirls her tounge, head down, but the eyes looking up like a puppy dog. Like "oh dear daddy, I love you". Just like that. Nobody else does it like her. I'd like to get a nickle everytime your girlfriend gives you a blow job.

    The patent office received 376,810 patent applications last year. It usually takes about two-and-a-half years for a patent to be processed. About 65 percent of all patents submitted are approved, Quinn said.

    There were over 200,000 patents approved last year? Sweet Jesus. I really should get around to a but whipe patent.

    "Very few patents are what one would call a 'pioneer patent,' meaning that the inventor discovered something very, very new that has never been discovered before," she said. "Most patents are given to changes to existing technology."

    I'll dip the toilet paper in water. That's it.

    "We bought a unique idea for making an everyday item more convenient (and) made a significant investment in the idea and in developing the innovative manufacturing technology that makes Uncrustables so easy to use," the company said.

    I wonder how this ruling will effect the Pop Tart corporation?

    Smucker's stock price fell 30 cents on Friday to close at $49.67 on the New York Stock Exchange.

    I can hear Gordon Gekko yelling "Bud FOX, Damn you!". I wish we knew how this PB&J thing really played out.

    --

    Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."

    1. Re:The article, with my analysis... by ConceptJunkie · · Score: 4, Funny

      You should probably also hate the improper-use-of-apostrophe Nazis too.

      --
      You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
  9. Re:As an aussie by kfg · · Score: 4, Funny

    (Now watch as someone proves me wrong.)

    Yeah, they can be a PITA like that.

    KFG

  10. Whose cuisine will reign supreme? by dangitman · · Score: 4, Funny
    Damn, I'm going to get Iron Chef Rokusaburo Michiba on the phone and hire him to patent hundreds of cooking techniques. Soon, I will own exclusive rights to ALL FOOD! I will win in Kitchen Stadium!!!

    Somebody pass me a foie gras and salmon roe pocket sandwich, I'm hungry. Today's theme ingredient is Intellectual Property!

    --
    ... and then they built the supercollider.
  11. Re:What's next - patenting how Mom makes Hash Brow by Grax · · Score: 5, Funny

    When peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are outlawed, only outlaws will have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.