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USPTO Demands EFF Censor Its Comments On Patentable Subject Matter

Posted by timothy on from the adversarial-justice-system dept.

An anonymous reader sends this report from TechDirt: As you know, last year the Supreme Court made a very important ruling in the Alice v. CLS Bank case, in which it basically said that merely doing something on a general purpose computer didn't automatically make it patentable. ... However, the USPTO apparently was offended at parts of the EFF's comment submission, claiming that it was an "improper protest." Protest or not, the EFF denies in strong terms that the original comments were improper.

3 of 71 comments (clear)

  1. Cue... by YuppieScum · · Score: 3, Informative

    ...Streisand Effect.

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    1. Re:Cue... by monkeyzoo · · Score: 3, Informative

      Everyone really should click through and read page 5 of the original document: https://www.eff.org/files/2015...

      The EFF redacted this entire page in response the USPTO request. Why did the USPTO not like it?... Because they got their ass summarily handed to them. The redaction compares two claims (one approved, one invalidated) that differ by LITERALLY ONLY A FEW WORDS. The USPTO is right to be embarrassed!

  2. Look at the table in the PDF by Cassini2 · · Score: 5, Informative

    In the PDF, there is a table in the PDF of the EFF's response where it compares the issued patent against the rejected patent at the Supreme Court. The wording is amazingly similar.

    The significant change between the two is patents swapping the words "banking transaction" for the use of "a credit or charge account", and then updating the rest of the text appropriately. If you do not understand what the EFF's point is, then take a look at the table. It does not take much imagination to see that the patent at stake in the Supreme Court case, and the newly issued patent, are almost identical.