[3972] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: How to put info in the public domain for patent puropses?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Phil Karn)
Thu Jan 14 13:59:39 1999
Date: Thu, 14 Jan 1999 09:30:11 -0800 (PST)
From: Phil Karn <karn@qualcomm.com>
To: reinhold@world.std.com
Cc: cryptography@c2.net, karn@qualcomm.com
In-reply-to: <v03130304b2c32c19854d@[24.128.119.92]> (reinhold@world.std.com)
>I f I recall correctly, the US Patent and Trademark Office has said that it
>would not consider information placed on the Internet to be published for
>patent purposes. Preparoing papers for journals or conferences is a pain,
Is this really true? I thought I had heard the opposite, but I'm not sure.
Not that it really matters, of course, because the PTO never bothers
to read much prior art (including even prior patents) before granting
a claim. Their apparent policy is to just sit on an application for
about 18 months during which time they may quibble about the precise
wording of a few claims to maintain the fiction that they really
"examine" them. Then they issue the patent -- no matter how obviously
bogus -- and let the courts sort it all out. It's all very depressing.
Phil
