the vast majority of patent applications are not algorithim or business oriented. For example the electrical engineering area, in particular telecommnications is way behind the curve for examinations.
The patent office didn't suddenly decide, ok, lets patent software and business methods. It was the appicants themselves, who used the court system, particualy the court of appeals to force the pto to begin to examine these types of applications.
Fault the courts and the applicants themselves. its not up to the pto to legislate or interpret the law, that falls to congress and the court system.
1. Patent examiners know what prior art is out there because they deal solely in a specific technology area (and are intimatly familiar with those sets of patents of record). What happens if the examiner knows of prior art not listed by the applicant? (This has yet to be addressed.)
The examiner can use whatever knowledge in his possession in order to invalidate a patent (whether derived from a 3rd party or not)
Yes, that is true as it currently stands, but the new patent plan is ambigious on this.
2. There is a conflict of interest by the private search firm. They are being paid to find prior art that the applicant really doesn't want them to find.
They are being employed directly by the PTO. If they do not catch enough prior art, then they will lose their contract. So where is the conflict of interest?
The search firms would be paid by the applicant, notby the PTO.
3. You are removing a function of government by eliminating searching.
Searching for prior art is a function that can be performed effectively by any organization, government or not. So why specifically are you identifying it as a "function of government".
The function of government (judicial branch and/or PTO) is to rule on the "art" in the patent based upon the content of the "found" prior art.
Searching is part of the examination process, the government has no conflict of interest as it doesn't recieve ownership of the patent (but does get issue and renewal fees). A fair and impartial search is a sovergin function.
On a side note, in europe, the examination and search functions are done by two different people within the EPO, they are switching over to the US system.
There would be a major change in the examination process. Examiners would no longer search for prior art, it would all be submitted by the applicant and the search would be preformed by a private search firm. The examiner then would then determine patentablility via that search.
There are several problems with this: 1. Patent examiners know what prior art is out there because they deal solely in a specific technology area (and are intimatly familiar with those sets of patents of record). What happens if the examiner knows of prior art not listed by the applicant? (This has yet to be addressed.)
2. There is a conflict of interest by the private search firm. They are being paid to find prior art that the applicant really doesn't want them to find.
3. You are removing a function of government by eliminating searching.
WRONG, you didnt read the whole thing didin't you!
There would be a major change in the examination process. Examiners would no longer search for prior art, it would all be submitted by the applicant and the search would be preformed by a private search firm. The examiner then would then determine patentablility via that search.
There are several problems with this: 1. Patent examiners know what prior art is out there because they deal solely in a specific technology area (and are intimatly familiar with those sets of patents of record). What happens if the examiner knows of prior art not listed by the applicant? (This has yet to be addressed.)
2. There is a conflict of interest by the private search firm. They are being paid to find prior art that the applicant really doesn't want them to find.
3. You are removing a function of government by eliminating searching.
for more info, http://www.popa.org thats the examiners union, im not a member by the way.
you have no idea do you? The main problem facing the office is pendancy, that is, in some technologies it takes 4 years from the date of filing before a new application reaches an examiner because of the increased number of filings. Hiring 2000 examiners will reduce pendancy because there are only so many cases an examiner can do.
http://www.popa.org is the patent examiners union. Read their critique.
where do you find published prior art for that? you don't. can you name one place that shows that? I can't.
What the examiner should have done was gotten an affidavit which said that a 3rd party had swung sideways as a child. that would have been valid prior art.
I think things would be different if the US was attacked/invaded as companies U.S. manufacturing and R&D facilities would be in danger, no matter where they would be located. It companies would have some incentive in working together if their physical assets are in danger, and there is no option to move elsewhere.
that is an apt description, but they would probably be prefered to be called firefighters, they have to go put out fires (i.e. problems with the machines).
at the engineering firm i used to work for they were just called network administrators
consoles cost less and usually have zero headaches.
the question is, what types of games do you play.
I personally like FPS like RTCW, flight sims(especially multiplayer ones like warbirds) and RTS like WCIII.
PC style controls aren't really utilized in the console world, but easily could be since usb ports are available on them.
I prefer to use consoles for arcade style gaming, japanese style rpgs and sports games. its not too much fun to have 4 people crowded around one monitor unless you are playing you don't know jack.
try putting that image on a pc monitor. for example output quake 2 at 320x200 or 640x480 to a television and it looks great, but not nearly as good as on a monitor.
"Even worse, the Ford Excursion emits less pollutants than any motorcycle on the road, thanks to nonexistent emissions regulations on bikes. If you're worried about the environment, you're actually helping it by driving a 6000-lb behemoth instead of a 500-lb bike."
true, but i can ride in the HOV lane by myself, as can most hybrids(but strangly enough, VW TDI's cant and they get similar fuel economy)
"Considering the new hybrid-electric Civic gets over 45mpg, and weighs several times what any motorcycle does, I'd say motorcycles are NOT fuel efficient."
Yesif you want to go pound for pound a motorcycle is less fuel efficent, but you can fit more bikes on a road than people commuting in an SUV. Go click on the wwww.commutercar.com link i posted above, it suggests using motorcycle sized cars for commuting allowing for greater density per lane.
I havent seen any funky exhaust coming out of my bike, but i do see it on plenty of cars that are running a little rich.
my vfr750 gets around 45mpg and does 0-60 in 3.0. its a honda as well.
heck my passat gets 36-38mpg on the highway. the big 3 should just adopt supercharger/turbo technology on more of its cars if people want displacement, the turbo isnt spooling up while the car is on the highway anyways.
most new bikes still get 30+mpg.
most oil in the US is not used in cars, its used for consumer/industrial goods and power generation.
www.commutercar.com is an interesting idea. its an electric car that is a good autocorsser and does 0-60 under 5 seconds. its range is only 80 miles and can have a quick charge in 10 minutes. too bad its super expsensive.
i saw it in a digital screen, the image was much clearer, but suffered from the "tron" effect, people just jumped out from the cgi backgrounds pasted behind them.
the upside was that you could actually see yoda moving around and he wasnt a blur like the first time i saw the movie
seeing it in digital did not make it a better movie, but seeing it on an IMAX, if properally formatted might be really nice for the battle scenes.
this deals with an INACTIVE address read claim 12 12. A method of automatically resending an electronic message originally sent to a receiving user at a destination address that is now invalid to a new address for the receiving user, wherein the new address has been registered with an address server, the method comprising the steps of:
a) creating an electronic message on a computer system, the electronic message having a first destination address;
b) sending the electronic message to a first server;
c) sending the electronic message from the first server to a second server associated with the destination address;
d) determining in the second server that the destination address is not valid; and thereafter
e) automatically sending a query to the address server to determine a new address associated with the destination address, wherein the address server stores the destination address in association with the new address;
f) returning the new address; and thereafter
g) automatically sending the electronic message to the new address.
I don't think that you understand that if engineers and scientists ruled the world, everything would work!
It would just be really boring.
BTW communism is evil, it ignores the soul of the man, and is focused on material goods, which not everyone is interested in, some people want MORE than others(greed) even when their basic needs are addressed.
Women are evil? No, but their thinking, and the thinking of most people run counter to the engineering thinking processes. Engineers are taught to think logically and apply the scientific method to problems. If people thought a little bit more with their minds, instead of immedatly using their hearts or insticts, there would be a lot less conflict in the world. I'm not saying to not use your heart, but to step back and use your mind as well.
As for the last one, heck, i see life as a test. In, my opinion life is like a poker game, you start out with a set of cards and try to advance to the top from there. Don't complain with the hand you are dealt and use what you have to make your life better.
As for me, i have an EE degree, got at one of the top schools in america, but i also have about 50 credit hours of humanities too.
FYI private school teachers get paid less than public school teachers and supposedly produce better results. That is probably because private schools can pick their students (we did have a 3 track system though), have smaller classes, and GASP require homework from kindergarden on up(i was pulling 2-3 hours a night in 2-3rd grade, which wasn't fun because my friends we all playing outside or watching tv after school).
im from new jersey and agree, they spend around 10k per kid in new jersey. Thats probably around 200k per classroom and plenty of money. I'm not sure though how they rank nationally though. I went to public school. Property tax values up there are very high though to pay for the school system.
People complain about teachers salary's but keep in mind they only work 9 months out of the year(look at your own salary and take 75% of it and compare it to a teachers salary, a teacher making 30k would make 40k etc), you can easily supplement that income during the summer with tutoring, summer school etc.
It is very rare that an application becomes a patent on the first action the examiner preforms on it, because there is usually something wrong with the application,there could be spelling errors, claims not supported by the specification, prior art over the claims, multiple dependant claims, identical claims as a previous application by the same inventor.
the patent office has a classification system for patents. each class and subclass contains hundreds of patents on the same subject, many of which seem identical to one another until you read the claims, that means one subclass might contain 300 remote controls, each of which communicate with a TV etc, but do something different, but yet have the same basic function.
As you said, most inventions are just that, incremental improvements of previous inventions, but thats what the patent system is for, it allows the full disclosure of inventions for others to improve upon in exchange for a limited monopoly.
Slashdot Mirror
the vast majority of patent applications are not algorithim or business oriented. For example the electrical engineering area, in particular telecommnications is way behind the curve for examinations.
The patent office didn't suddenly decide, ok, lets patent software and business methods. It was the appicants themselves, who used the court system, particualy the court of appeals to force the pto to begin to examine these types of applications.
Fault the courts and the applicants themselves. its not up to the pto to legislate or interpret the law, that falls to congress and the court system.
Fees are signifigantly lower for small companies or independant inventors.
/ fe e20011001.htm
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/ac/qs/ope/1999
look at the right hand column. The fees are half price for the most part.
1. Patent examiners know what prior art is out there because they deal solely in a specific technology area (and are intimatly familiar with those sets of patents of record). What happens if the examiner knows of prior art not listed by the applicant? (This has yet to be addressed.) The examiner can use whatever knowledge in his possession in order to invalidate a patent (whether derived from a 3rd party or not) Yes, that is true as it currently stands, but the new patent plan is ambigious on this. 2. There is a conflict of interest by the private search firm. They are being paid to find prior art that the applicant really doesn't want them to find. They are being employed directly by the PTO. If they do not catch enough prior art, then they will lose their contract. So where is the conflict of interest? The search firms would be paid by the applicant, notby the PTO. 3. You are removing a function of government by eliminating searching. Searching for prior art is a function that can be performed effectively by any organization, government or not. So why specifically are you identifying it as a "function of government". The function of government (judicial branch and/or PTO) is to rule on the "art" in the patent based upon the content of the "found" prior art. Searching is part of the examination process, the government has no conflict of interest as it doesn't recieve ownership of the patent (but does get issue and renewal fees). A fair and impartial search is a sovergin function. On a side note, in europe, the examination and search functions are done by two different people within the EPO, they are switching over to the US system.
for more info read the patent plan and the response via the examiners union.
i nd ex.htm
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/com/strat2001/
http://www.popa.org
Here are a few of the changes.
There would be a major change in the examination process. Examiners would no longer search for prior art, it would all be submitted by the applicant and the search would be preformed by a private search firm. The examiner then would then determine patentablility via that search.
There are several problems with this:
1. Patent examiners know what prior art is out there because they deal solely in a specific technology area (and are intimatly familiar with those sets of patents of record). What happens if the examiner knows of prior art not listed by the applicant? (This has yet to be addressed.)
2. There is a conflict of interest by the private search firm. They are being paid to find prior art that the applicant really doesn't want them to find.
3. You are removing a function of government by eliminating searching.
WRONG, you didnt read the whole thing didin't you!
There would be a major change in the examination process. Examiners would no longer search for prior art, it would all be submitted by the applicant and the search would be preformed by a private search firm. The examiner then would then determine patentablility via that search.
There are several problems with this:
1. Patent examiners know what prior art is out there because they deal solely in a specific technology area (and are intimatly familiar with those sets of patents of record). What happens if the examiner knows of prior art not listed by the applicant? (This has yet to be addressed.)
2. There is a conflict of interest by the private search firm. They are being paid to find prior art that the applicant really doesn't want them to find.
3. You are removing a function of government by eliminating searching.
for more info, http://www.popa.org
thats the examiners union, im not a member by the way.
you have no idea do you? The main problem facing the office is pendancy, that is, in some technologies it takes 4 years from the date of filing before a new application reaches an examiner because of the increased number of filings. Hiring 2000 examiners will reduce pendancy because there are only so many cases an examiner can do.
http://www.popa.org is the patent examiners union. Read their critique.
where do you find published prior art for that? you don't. can you name one place that shows that? I can't.
What the examiner should have done was gotten an affidavit which said that a 3rd party had swung sideways as a child. that would have been valid prior art.
I think things would be different if the US was attacked/invaded as companies U.S. manufacturing and R&D facilities would be in danger, no matter where they would be located. It companies would have some incentive in working together if their physical assets are in danger, and there is no option to move elsewhere.
that is an apt description, but they would probably be prefered to be called firefighters, they have to go put out fires (i.e. problems with the machines).
at the engineering firm i used to work for they were just called network administrators
pc wargamers are known tobe in their 35-50 age, read a bunch of old issues of PC gamer, they discuss this very issue.
war games aren't hugely popular (im not talkingabout RTS games) but they do scew things a bit.
i use both, but PC games still have a slightly older audience. this is probably because wargamming/strategy gamers skew the average age upwards.
when you have a different audience, games are designed towards that audience.
consoles cost less and usually have zero headaches.
the question is, what types of games do you play.
I personally like FPS like RTCW, flight sims(especially multiplayer ones like warbirds) and RTS like WCIII.
PC style controls aren't really utilized in the console world, but easily could be since usb ports are available on them.
I prefer to use consoles for arcade style gaming, japanese style rpgs and sports games. its not too much fun to have 4 people crowded around one monitor unless you are playing you don't know jack.
try putting that image on a pc monitor. for example output quake 2 at 320x200 or 640x480 to a television and it looks great, but not nearly as good as on a monitor.
Is this patent retarded?" test for patent examiners to focus on.
examiners decide wether or not something is patentable, not wether or not it is a good idea or marketable. that is for the public to decide.
"Even worse, the Ford Excursion emits less pollutants than any motorcycle on the road, thanks to nonexistent emissions regulations on bikes. If you're worried about the environment, you're actually helping it by driving a 6000-lb behemoth instead of a 500-lb bike."
true, but i can ride in the HOV lane by myself, as can most hybrids(but strangly enough, VW TDI's cant and they get similar fuel economy)
"Considering the new hybrid-electric Civic gets over 45mpg, and weighs several times what any motorcycle does, I'd say motorcycles are NOT fuel efficient."
Yesif you want to go pound for pound a motorcycle is less fuel efficent, but you can fit more bikes on a road than people commuting in an SUV. Go click on the wwww.commutercar.com link i posted above, it suggests using motorcycle sized cars for commuting allowing for greater density per lane.
I havent seen any funky exhaust coming out of my bike, but i do see it on plenty of cars that are running a little rich.
change displacement to fuel economy
my vfr750 gets around 45mpg and does 0-60 in 3.0.
its a honda as well.
heck my passat gets 36-38mpg on the highway. the big 3 should just adopt supercharger/turbo technology on more of its cars if people want displacement, the turbo isnt spooling up while the car is on the highway anyways.
most new bikes still get 30+mpg.
most oil in the US is not used in cars, its used for consumer/industrial goods and power generation.
www.commutercar.com is an interesting idea. its an electric car that is a good autocorsser and does 0-60 under 5 seconds. its range is only 80 miles and can have a quick charge in 10 minutes.
too bad its super expsensive.
i saw it in a digital screen, the image was much clearer, but suffered from the "tron" effect, people just jumped out from the cgi backgrounds pasted behind them.
the upside was that you could actually see yoda moving around and he wasnt a blur like the first time i saw the movie
seeing it in digital did not make it a better movie, but seeing it on an IMAX, if properally formatted might be really nice for the battle scenes.
this deals with an INACTIVE address
read claim 12
12. A method of automatically resending an electronic message originally sent to a receiving user at a destination address that is now invalid to a new address for the receiving user, wherein the new address has been registered with an address server, the method comprising the steps of:
a) creating an electronic message on a computer system, the electronic message having a first destination address;
b) sending the electronic message to a first server;
c) sending the electronic message from the first server to a second server associated with the destination address;
d) determining in the second server that the destination address is not valid; and thereafter
e) automatically sending a query to the address server to determine a new address associated with the destination address, wherein the address server stores the destination address in association with the new address;
f) returning the new address; and thereafter
g) automatically sending the electronic message to the new address.
I don't think that you understand that if engineers and scientists ruled the world, everything would work!
It would just be really boring.
BTW communism is evil, it ignores the soul of the man, and is focused on material goods, which not everyone is interested in, some people want MORE than others(greed) even when their basic needs are addressed.
Women are evil? No, but their thinking, and the thinking of most people run counter to the engineering thinking processes. Engineers are taught to think logically and apply the scientific method to problems. If people thought a little bit more with their minds, instead of immedatly using their hearts or insticts, there would be a lot less conflict in the world. I'm not saying to not use your heart, but to step back and use your mind as well.
As for the last one, heck, i see life as a test. In, my opinion life is like a poker game, you start out with a set of cards and try to advance to the top from there. Don't complain with the hand you are dealt and use what you have to make your life better.
As for me, i have an EE degree, got at one of the top schools in america, but i also have about 50 credit hours of humanities too.
let me correct myself, i went to private school.
FYI private school teachers get paid less than public school teachers and supposedly produce better results. That is probably because private schools can pick their students (we did have a 3 track system though), have smaller classes, and GASP require homework from kindergarden on up(i was pulling 2-3 hours a night in 2-3rd grade, which wasn't fun because my friends we all playing outside or watching tv after school).
im from new jersey and agree, they spend around 10k per kid in new jersey. Thats probably around 200k per classroom and plenty of money. I'm not sure though how they rank nationally though. I went to public school. Property tax values up there are very high though to pay for the school system.
People complain about teachers salary's but keep in mind they only work 9 months out of the year(look at your own salary and take 75% of it and compare it to a teachers salary, a teacher making 30k would make 40k etc), you can easily supplement that income during the summer with tutoring, summer school etc.
the trend is in excess of 95% are rejected.
It is very rare that an application becomes a patent on the first action the examiner preforms on it, because there is usually something wrong with the application,there could be spelling errors, claims not supported by the specification, prior art over the claims, multiple dependant claims, identical claims as a previous application by the same inventor.
the patent office has a classification system for patents. each class and subclass contains hundreds of patents on the same subject, many of which seem identical to one another until you read the claims, that means one subclass might contain 300 remote controls, each of which communicate with a TV etc, but do something different, but yet have the same basic function.
As you said, most inventions are just that, incremental improvements of previous inventions, but thats what the patent system is for, it allows the full disclosure of inventions for others to improve upon in exchange for a limited monopoly.
the patent office recieves around 400k patent applications a year and has for quite some time
to contrast that, there are about ~6.5 million patents, about 2 million of which date from the past 20 years.
i hope that helps to put it into perspective, i dont think most posters realize that.
i agree actually, most people on slashdot have no real experience with patents or even understand how the examining system works.
perhaps an interview with a media contact at the USPTO would help to clear this up.