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The Patent and Trademark Office has now made clear that its newly developed position on patentable subject matter will invalidate many and perhaps most software patents, including pioneering patent claims to such innovators as Google, Inc. In a series of cases including In re Nuijten, In re Comiskey and In re Bilski, the Patent and Trademark Office has argued in favor of imposing new restrictions on the scope of patentable subject matter set forth by Congress in § 101 of the Patent Act. In the most recent of these three—the currently pending en banc Bilski appeal—the Office takes the position...

Electrical-energy-storage unit (EESU) utilizing ceramic and integrated-circuit technologies for replacement of electrochemical batteries IS THIS A HOAX? IS THIS FOR REAL?

Technology has always played a big role in fighting terrorism. Some inventions are truly useful and will undoubtedly save lives, whereas others are so bizarre that one wonders how in the world they got patented. This list is about the latter: Behold the Top 10 Strangest Anti-Terrorism Patents!(Note: yes, most of these patents cite fighting terrorism as raison d'être)Anti-Terrorist Truck U.S. Patent 4667565, Rapid response patrol and antiterrorist vehicle by Reg. A. Anderson. Issued May 26, 1987. Problem: Terrorists can pop up at any time, leaving local authorities totally defenseless against their raging attacks.Solution: When terrorists walk past this non-descript...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday limited the ability of companies to collect multiple royalties on their patents, the latest step by the justices to scale back the power of patent-holders. The unanimous decision, which was helpful to customers of Intel Corp., involved a longtime Supreme Court doctrine that in recent years had been eroded by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C., which handles patent cases nationally. Justice Clarence Thomas reined in the appeals court, saying that "for over 150 years the Supreme Court has applied the doctrine of patent exhaustion" and...

The proposed Patent Reform Act of 2007 will be coming up for a vote in the Senate in a few months. A similar version of the bill has already passed in the House. The bill has certain relatively benign provisions, but let's ignore them since they just cloud the argument and are of little interest to either side in the debate. Let's instead just cut to the chase. In lay terms, the bill makes it easier to challenge issued patents and harder for patent holders to obtain compensation through the U.S. legal system. Regardless of how that sounds to you,...

Not long ago we reported that Monster Cable had issued a cease and desist letter to Blue Jeans Cable about their Tartan cables. Little did the lawyer drones over at Monster know that Kurt Denke, the president of Blue Jeans was, in a former life, a lawyer by trade. Oops! Someone pushed around the wrong "small" company! While we are no legal experts, we recognize humor when we see it. And this is funny. With Blue Jeans Cable's permission, we've included their full response to Monster's letter below. Kurt wants to keep this entire process completely open to the public...

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) has sponsored an unusual provision at the urging of the nation's banks granting them immunity against an active patent lawsuit, potentially saving them billions of dollars. The federal government would have to pay $1 billion to the owner, DataTreasury, over 10 years as compensation ....... The provision, passed without dissent by the Senate Judiciary Committee in July and inserted into legislation scheduled for a vote by the full Senate this month ....... Political action committees of financial institutions were the largest single category of industry donors to Sessions, with $52,300 in the current election cycle, the...

A new book claims to have definitive evidence of a long-suspected technological crime — that Alexander Graham Bell stole ideas for the telephone from a rival, Elisha Gray. In "The Telephone Gambit: Chasing Alexander Graham Bell's Secret," journalist Seth Shulman argues that Bell — aided by aggressive lawyers and a corrupt patent examiner — got an improper peek at patent documents Gray had filed, and that Bell was erroneously credited with filing first. Shulman believes the smoking gun is Bell's lab notebook, which was restricted by Bell's family until 1976, then digitized and made widely available in 1999. The notebook...

I've been trying to avoid posting a vanity but I just cannot find the answer to my questions.If someone has an idea to improve an existing product, how would they begin the process of patenting/trademarking the product?I have called local patent lawyers and cannot get in the front door. I have looked at the gov't website and cannot make heads or tails of the process. I'd rather pay a couple hundred bucks to professionals to do it.But if anyone can gimme a hand with getting started, I'd be very appreciative.Do I need technical drawings? Stuff like that... FReepers are the...

Measure passed in U.S. House aims to protect environment. A measure that would amend the General Mining Law of 1872 to establish environmental protections and eliminate land patenting passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday. Rep. John Salazar, D-Colo, voted with the 244-166 majority and hailed the legislation for its environmental protections and reclamation requirements on hard-rock mining. “I have heard from constituents in Crested Butte, the Summitville area, and throughout Colorado who want to protect our precious water resources,” said Salazar, whose 3rd Congressional District includes most of the Western Slope. “After 135 years, I am glad the...

What could make the Free Software Foundation (FSF), proprietary software companies, and at least one venture capitalist into allies? The End Software Patents (ESP) coalition, a new organization poised to swing into action next month under the leadership of Ben Klemens. The campaign currently has seed funding of a quarter million dollars from sources those associated with the group won't disclose, and hopes to augment that with donations from individuals and companies for a struggle that, to judge by the usual amount of time it takes to push major changes through the US Supreme Court, could take five years or...

A Virginia court granted GlaxoSmithKline PLC's request for a preliminary injunction blocking the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office from implementing new rules that the pharmaceutical giant says will cause it "and other innovative companies like it" irreparable harm. "It's a good day for innovators in this country because the new rules would have stifled innovation," GlaxoSmithKline's lawyer, John Desmarais, said.The proposed rules, which were scheduled to go into effect Thursday, reduced the number of times a patent applicant could contest or amend rejected or pending patent claims. Previously, applicants could file an unlimited number of amendments or challenges, known in...

Patent Infringement Lawsuit Filed Against Red Hat & Novell - Just Like Ballmer Predicted Thursday, October 11 2007 @ 09:41 PM EDT IP Innovation LLC has just filed a patent infringement claim against Red Hat and Novell. It was filed October 9, case no. 2:2007cv00447, IP Innovation, LLC et al v. Red Hat Inc. et al, in Texas. Where else? The patent troll magnet state. The first ever patent infringement litigation involving Linux. Here's the patent, for those who can look at it without risk. If in doubt, don't. Here's the complaint [PDF]. And now let's play, where's Microsoft? You...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a technology patent case that has the potential to throw the entire technology supply chain into upheaval -- or prompt closer adherence to technology licensing terms. Those disparate outcomes are both possible from a case involving two parties that aren't even U.S. companies. In 2000, LG Electronics of Korea sued Quanta Computer and several other Taiwanese PC makers, claiming the firms were violating LG's U.S. patents by using them without authorization -- courtesy of Intel. When the justices hear the case in coming months, they'll be confronted with the question of...

The House yesterday passed the most comprehensive patent reform in half a century, delivering a victory for computer technology and financial services companies and leaving drug companies, small inventors, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office bracing for a bigger fight before the bill hits the Senate floor. The bill, which passed 225 to 175 with strong bipartisan support, is meant to reduce the mounting number of patent infringement cases by changing the ways patents are awarded and challenged. Because much of the bill is perceived to be favorable to targets of patent-infringement suits rather than patent holders, it has...

It was early April 1997 when I received a frantic telephone call from Washington. “You need to get on your horse and get here ASAP. We have a job to do...a very big job.” As it was explained, the US patent system was under attack by a coalition of globalist forces including the President and Vice President of the United States, the congressional leadership (Republican and Democrat), the Japanese government, the Chinese government, the National Association of Manufacturers, and eighty or ninety of America’s largest multinational corporations, including Microsoft, IBM, Motorola, and scores of others. It was, arguably, the most...

In extraordinary coordination, the judiciary committees of both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives in the same week approved a bill, which, if it becomes law, will spell the end of America's world leadership in innovation. Called the Patent Reform Act, it is a direct attack on the unique and successful patent system created by the U.S. Constitution. Before 1999, the U.S. Patent Office was required to keep secret the contents of a patent application until a patent was granted, and to return the application in secret to the inventor if a patent was denied. That protected the legal...

Getting to the Root Problem This whole Microsoft-Novell-GPL-who-gets-what-for-how-much-and-for-whose-3rd-child deal has many people confused, stumped, and scratching their heads. And did I mention that some people find this whole thing confusing? Highly educated people - even people with legal backgrounds - get headaches thinking about it. On the surface, it seems fairly simple. Microsoft claims a fair amount of FOSS code infringes their patents. This scares business users who are generally interested in the idea of deploying GNU/Linux in their enterprises. Microsoft and Novell reach an agreement that, without violating the specific terms of the GPL, offers patent infringement protection, similar...

Madison, WI (LifeNews.com) -- The Wisconsin company that holds the patent on most embryonic stem cells is challenging the federal government's rejection of its patent. The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation holds the patents on researcher James Thompson's work and has called it a "landmark invention." Thompson is considered the first to isolate human embryonic stem cells in 1998, a controversial work because human embryos must be destroyed to obtain them. WARF currently holds three patents that it says essentially give it rights over all of the human embryonic stem cells in the U.S.The U.S Patent and Trademark Office issued a...

Canadian encryption vendor Certicom yesterday filed a wide-ranging lawsuit against Sony, claiming that many of the products offered by the electronics giant infringe on two Certicom patents. This might sound like business as usual until you realize what's being targeted: AACS and (by extension) the PlayStation 3. Certicom has done extensive work in elliptic curve cryptography (ECC), and the patents in question build on this work. The patents have already been licensed by groups like the US National Security Agency, which paid $25 million back in 2003 for the right to use 26 Certicom patents, including the two in the...

This is news indeed. Todd Bishop has the story. Eben Moglen is saying that the SUSE vouchers Microsoft is distributing have no expiration date! I didn't know this. It's huge. This is, according to Moglen's remarks, another defense to any patent infringement claim by Microsoft, and it may well bring that campaign to a screeching halt. Here's why. Someone, Moglen says, is bound to turn a voucher it got from Microsoft in after GPLv3 goes into effect and GPLv3 code is being distributed, and at that moment Microsoft comes under its terms. And that should mean the end of Microsoft's...

Article Cant be posted because its from AP, here is the link http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/MICROSOFT_OPEN_SOURCE?SITE=AZMES&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT Score Card Linux Kernel - 42 GUI (KDE,..) - 65 E-Mail Progs - 15 'Other" ------ 68 OpenOffice --- 45 I am most skeptical of the GUI and email numbers as those lend themselves to some of the most ridiculous patents (eg mouse over stuff). It will be interesting to see if MS releases the patents for the Linux kernel so that changes can be made, if needed, to address their concerns and while IANAL I believe they have an obligation to mitigate the damages form infringement...

The controversial patent agreement between Microsoft and Novell included an intellectual property agreement that gave Novell's engineers access to Microsoft code, as well as a covenant not to sue each other's customers, Novell has confirmed. The two companies announced their patent deal in November 2006 as part of a wider interoperability effort but described it as a covenant not to sue each other's customers in order to avoid falling foul of the GNU General Public License used for Linux. The deal also included an agreement that gave Novell engineers access to Microsoft code, however, according to the company's director of...

Excerpt - A recent out-of-court settlement between Apple Computer and a Vermont-based inventor has landed Apple the rights to a prestigious software design patent that may allow the company to seek royalties on a broad spectrum of digital downloads. Michael Starkweather, a lawyer and author of the 10-year old patent, issued a statement on Thursday calling it a "billion dollar patent" that will have affects on the future of the "cell phone, iPod and PDA" industries. "I believe that, with this patent in hand, Apple will eventually be after every phone company, film maker, computer maker and video producer to...

Any person, who is just getting acquainted with the Russian patent legislation, may feel a bit giddy: lack of development and ambiguity of legal norms make it possible to register any discovery in one’s name from the chair to the fork and claim the fee from manufacturers. Russian patent law was almost inviolate derived from the Soviet legislation, which wasn’t influenced by global tendencies due to the total isolation. Today some of its sections sound so awkwardly that they may be patented themselves.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- IBM has filed two patent infringement lawsuits against Amazon.com for unspecified damages, the company announced Monday. The lawsuits are over five patents that IBM alleges that Amazon has infringed upon, which it says the online retailer uses in its customer recommendations and purchase system, web site navigation and the way its stores data on its network, according to an IBM spokesman. IBM says it has notified Amazon.com several times of the alleged infringement since September 2002, but the companies have not been able to resolve the issue. The suits were filed in two District Courts for...

OK folks you can't make this stuff up. The patent office is going crazy! First, obvious software patents, and now this: "As the American tax law gets more and more complicated, lawyers have come up with one more way to make life difficult for taxpayers: Now you may face a patent infringement suit if you use a tax strategy that someone else thought of first.".....

Scheming is afoot in Congress to create an unjustified loophole in the patent laws for foreign infringers despite dampening the incentive to American businesses to invent. Legislation has been proposed that would facilitate the unauthorized importation of products made outside the United States by means of a process protected by a U.S. patent.

In Marxist theory, capitalist drones afflicted by false consciousness are constantly indulging in the fetishism of commodities -- placing material possessions on an absurdly high pedestal. Likewise, critics of the practice of obtaining patent protection on life forms -- generally found on the neo-Marxist left -- object that by patenting life we heartlessly commodify it. More fundamentally than either the argument from exploitation (or that from enclosure), the commodification objection confronts the very essence of the practice of patenting life. If exploitation critics focused on the potential for suffering by one side of the transaction, and if the enclosure opponents...

Method and system for selecting and conjugating a verb Abstract A verb conjugating system allows a user to input a form of a verb and display the verb forms. The verb conjugating system allows the user to input the infinitive form or non-infinitive forms of a verb. When a user inputs a non-infinitive form of a verb, the verb conjugating system identifies a corresponding base form of the verb. The verb conjugating system then uses the base form to retrieve and display the verb forms for the verb. The verb conjugating system may highlight the non-infinitive form of the verb...

Small business, beware. If this tale were a summer horror movie, it might be called When Apple Lawyers Attack. Or perhaps The Pod Patrol. Apple Computer Inc. of Cupertino, Calif., beloved by designers, graphic artists, and other creative types for its anti-Establishment mythos, has been going after entrepreneurs for their use of the word pod in their businesses. Indeed, Apple has applied to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to register the word pod as a trademark, in addition to the proper noun iPod, which it already owns. Medford small-business woman Terry Wilson discovered this when a letter made its...

Three patents held by a Wisconsin alumni group may throw a bigger roadblock into stem cell research in the United States than federal funding restrictions, a leading stem cell scientist said Tuesday. The patents give the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation broad rights over human embryonic stem cell lines in the United States. Anyone who wants to derive medical therapies or other commercial products from embryonic stem cells may have to obtain permission and pay royalties to the foundation, affiliated with the University of Wisconsin. As a result, scientists are going overseas where their research can occur unfettered, said Jeanne Loring,...

A company formed after the burst of the Internet bubble to control assets of defunct ZapMedia Inc. has received a patent from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that could potentially send shock waves through industries that distribute digital audio and video content over the Internet. ZapMedia Services, which now owns Patent No. 7,020,704, has put it up for sale. Organizing negotiations, Atlanta-based Lava Group Inc., which manages patents and intellectual property, has been fielding calls from executives becoming aware of ZapMedia's portfolio. ZapMedia's patent describes a distribution model for audio and video digital content, a combination of streaming media...

In a move that could have huge implications for the US patent system, the Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments in the case of KSR v. Teleflex. The case centers on the question of obviousness: when is a patent so... patently obvious that it should not be granted? KSR International manufactures gas pedals for a number of GM trucks and SUVs. A few years ago, it came up with an electronic sensor that could automatically adjust the height of a vehicle's pedals to the height of a driver. Teleflex sued KSR, saying that the adjustable pedals infringed on its...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday agreed to take up a case involving one of the thornier questions in patent law: What makes an invention "obvious"--and therefore unworthy of a patent? The case at issue involves patents covering "gas pedal" technology for cars and light trucks. It was accepted on appeal by a company called KSR International, Inc., which had been accused of patent infringement by a firm called Teleflex. Last January, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed an earlier court decision last that found patents held by Teleflex were "obvious" and therefore invalid. But Silicon...

The Supreme Court said Thursday it is not ready to decide what science can and cannot be patented. For now, justices won't roll back patent rights. But three court members said they were ready. The court, on a 5-3 vote, ended what could have been a landmark patent case with a one-sentence opinion saying it made a mistake by agreeing to resolve a dispute over a test for diagnosing vitamin deficiencies. In a dissent, Justices Stephen Breyer, John Paul Stevens and David H. Souter said their colleagues were dodging an important case. "Those who engage in medical research, who practice...

The European Patent Office will be bound by proposed legislation that will exclude software from patentability, according to the EC, in a move that has startled opponents of software patents Software patent campaigners were shocked on Wednesday by an apparent change in stance towards software patents by the European Commission. The European Commission said last week that computer programs will be excluded from patentability in the upcoming Community Patent legislation, and that the European Patent Office (EPO) will be bound by this law. "The EPO would... apply and be bound by a new unitary Community law with respect to Community...

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Supreme Court has tipped the balance in patent disputes ever so slightly toward the users of patented technology and away from inventors, owners of intellectual property and the hated "patent trolls"--companies that make money by suing for infringement of patents they own but don't use. In a victory for eBay (nasdaq: EBAY - news - people), the justices ruled unanimously that federal courts must weigh several factors before barring a patent infringer from using a contested technology or business method.The online auction house had petitioned the Supreme Court to review the practice of automatically issuing...

Microsoft, Autodesk lose patent case $133 million verdict awarded in favor of Michigan tech firm DALLAS - A federal jury in East Texas returned a $133 million verdict against Microsoft Corp. and Autodesk Inc. for infringing on two software patents owned by a Michigan technology company. The lawsuit, filed in 2004 by z4 Technologies of Commerce Township, Mich., claimed Microsoft and Autodesk used two z4 patents in their Office and AutoCad software programs without paying royalty fees.

For the first time in a quarter-century, the Supreme Court will hear on Tuesday a case involving the basic question of what type of discoveries and inventions can be patented. Both sides say the case, which involves a blood test for a vitamin deficiency, could have a wide-ranging impact on the development of diagnostics, perhaps threatening many of the underlying patents for genetic and other medical tests. But the array of companies filing supporting briefs — including American Express, Bear Stearns and I.B.M. — indicates that intellectual property in other fields might also be affected. Some patent specialists say they...

WASHINGTON - B vitamin deficiencies can cause a range of serious health effects, including spinal defects in children born to women with below-normal levels of folic acid and anemia in people not getting enough B12. That‘s why a two-step method of diagnosing those deficiencies that three medical school doctors patented in 1990 has become so widely used. It‘s performed tens of millions of times a year, at a cost of just a dollar or two, by laboratory testing companies nationwide. Even more surprising is that the Supreme Court may dredge up a bombshell question not asked when the lower...

Richmond, Va. -- The U.S. patent office on Wednesday issued its first of several anticipated final rejections of patents held by NTP Inc. related to Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry device, two days before a judge will hear arguments on an injunction on the wireless e-mail service. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is expected to issue final rejections of four other patents at the heart of the court case, but it's unclear when those actions could come. Another uncertainty is whether the agency's act will sway U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer, who has made it clear he is...

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) has issued a non-final rejection of a fifth patent in NTP’s lawsuit against Research In Motion (RIM), according to a lawyer for NTP, Reuters reports. Research In Motion is the maker of the popular BlackBerry handheld, and the case could lead to a shutdown of RIM’s U.S. sales and services. The PTO has currently issued non-final rejections of all five patents in the BlackBerry infringement case, currently pending before a federal judge, the article says. James Wallace, an NTP attorney, said the company has the opportunity to respond within 30 days, after which...

The Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry warned that the technology gap between China and Korea has been narrowing and the technology leakage to China is at a level for concern. The technology difference between the two countries was found to be 4.6 years. The National Intelligence Service through its Web site said that industrial spies are bustling around Korea. Korea is stuck between Japan and China, and it can survive and prosper if only it succeeds in competiting both in technology and price at the same time. Hu Jintao, China's president, announced during the country's National Science and Technology...

A SEA CHANGE IN PATENT LAW Proposed Legislation Would Wean the United States from a 'First to Invent' Approval System BY STEVE SEIDENBERG Gordon Gould was still a graduate student in physics at Columbia University when he made his breakthrough in November 1957. He developed a way to use beams of light to perform an array of tasks. A half-century later, Gould’s invention is integral to the technology revolution—it can be used to perform delicate eye surgery without harming vision, it translates the digital messages on CDs and DVDs, it reads barcodes, and it helps make high-speed data communications possible....

IBM is expected to announce Tuesday that it won more U.S. patents than any other company and that it will participate in three initiatives to improve patent quality. For the thirteenth consecutive year, IBM was awarded the most patents--more than 2,900--by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, according to the company. IBM is also expected to detail three multiparty efforts to increase review of patent applications, in part by tapping open-source developers and collaborative software. Partners include the Patent Office and the Open Source Development Labs (OSDL), an industry consortium that launched a "patent commons" for open-source communities in November...

The order was potentially a big one for KSR International Co. General Motors Corp. (GM) wanted the Canadian auto parts maker to supply gas pedals for its 2003 Chevrolet and GMC light trucks and sport-utility vehicles. But not just any pedals. GM wanted adjustable ones that could move back and forth to accommodate drivers of different heights. And it wanted the pedals to send an electronic signal, rather than using a mechanical cable, to change the engine speed when a driver stepped on or off the accelerator.

The BlackBerry service, based on the handheld e-mail device that has become a must-have tool for the business elite, could be shutdown in the United States after a bitter legal battle over a key patent. This week, NTP, a small firm that holds a crucial patent that allows e-mails to be sent to mobile devices, announced a licence agreement with Visto Corp - an arch-rival of Research In Motion. (RIM), the company that created the BlackBerry. The announcement could put further pressure on RIM to settle a patent claim from NTP which could be worth up to $1 billion (£565...

TORONTO, Dec. 9 (Reuters) - The patent holding company NTP Inc. has rejected an offer by Research In Motion, maker of the BlackBerry e-mail device, to settle their patent dispute and the two sides are not currently negotiating, NTP's co-founder, Don Stout, said Friday. Mr. Stout said Research In Motion had made an "unacceptable" written offer Thursday to settle their patent infringement case, a lawsuit that could shut down the popular BlackBerry e-mail service in the United States. "They have responded yesterday in a manner which is unacceptable so we're not negotiating," Mr. Stout said. Research In Motion did not...

TORONTO -- NTP Inc. would settle its longstanding patent-infringement dispute with Research In Motion Ltd. for a payment equal to 5.7% of RIM's future U.S. BlackBerry revenue, according to a person familiar with the situation. It's not clear what amount such a royalty would represent, though it would likely be at least several hundreds of millions of dollars. NTP's patents last until 2012. RIM's revenue in the latest quarter was $490.1 million, and most of its BlackBerry subscribers are in the U.S. Walterloo, Ontario-based RIM and NTP, a Virginia patent holding firm, in March had announced a preliminary settlement in...