Supreme Court to Rule On 'Obvious' Patents

vocaro writes "The U.S. Supreme Court appears ready to rewrite the standard of what makes a patent 'obvious.' In a case before the court, brake manufacturer Teleflex is accusing a rival, KSR International, of violating its patent on a brake assembly. Large patent holders, including Microsoft, IBM, and Cisco, have submitted briefs supporting KSR, saying that true innovators can have a patent held up against them that reflects nothing more than an obvious combination of preexisting elements, then be told they have to leave the market or pay royalties. The court appears to be on KSR's side, saying that Teleflex's invention would have been obvious to an individual of reasonable skill. During oral arguments, Justice Breyer observed, 'It looks to me at about the same level as I have a sensor on my garage door at the lower hinge ... and the raccoons are eating it. So I think of the brainstorm of putting it on the upper hinge.'"

Comments

Yeah for the raccoons

[Pharmboy]

Gotta love the analogy with the raccoons. Sounds like a judge finally gets it.

Re:Yeah for the raccoons

[Rodyland]

As with most, inclined to agree, however I like this quote from the article:
In hindsight everybody says, 'I could've thought of that,'...

Strikes me as true, and as always when claiming something is obvious, it begs the question "how come you didn't think of it then?"

I think this exposes a fundamental problem with the system - you have judges and lawyers deciding what is and isn't obvious/patentable. And I think that a swing too far in the opposite direction would be just as harmful as the (current) swing in the direction of extreme patentism (hah, I just made up a word). Of course, it'd be an interesting thing to behold.

Re:Yeah for the raccoons

[Pharmboy]

No matter where you "draw the line" in reference to what is obvious and what is not, SOMEONE will always get hurt. Absolute rules, while sometimes necessary, tend to do that.

I believe the goal is to set a rule that hurts as few as possible, and with the same number of people on both sides of the issue. The goal of any judicial system isn't perfection, just fairness.