aaronvonbaron

The first audiobook I played for my kids was How to Train Your Dragon. David Tennant did an amazing job. Now my kids love audiobooks. Although, I still need to force them to read paper books. We also loved the Zamonia series by Walter Moers.

I have been using WordWeb Pro for years now, which pops up when you hover over a word and ctrl + right click. One of the many references available for purchase is the shorter Oxford English Dictionary. Others include their own dictionary with audio pronunciation, Chambers Dictionary and Thesaurus, New Oxford American Dictionary, and Collins English Dictionary. I have purchased all except Collins which I have in print. Since I work in patent prosecution and litigation, I use WordWeb many times per day. I also have print additions of many older dictionaries and other resources to ascertain the meaning of a word at the time the invention. It's amazing to look at multiple definitions and realize that each resource can have slightly or very different meanings.

I am starting to believe that large, established, companies with large market share and large patent portfolios have little use for 95% of their patent portfolio. First, many patents are either weak or outdated by the time they issue. Maybe the company has changed directions from the time the patent application was filed. Or, there also might be a "file first and ask questions later policy" for many companies, so that valuable inventions are captured along with the junk patents, a bycatch of sorts. Then, the company can enhance their reputation in some communities by giving away patent rights. Second, the purpose of patents is to exclude others from making your invention for a period of time in exchange for teaching the invention to the public. This can be useful for smaller players, including individual inventors, who do not have a large market share and comparatively little money. Larger companies do not have as much need to exclude competition through use of IP, because they have already excluded competition in the market. Although, there are still the clash of the titans, such as Apple and Samsung.

A patent is not a monopoly in the pure sense, meaning there is no consumer choice and the consumer must buy what is patented at the asking price. It is quite the opposite in most situations. The competition between companies is fierce. Several companies may have competing similar products, each with their own patents.

I help companies look at patents and find ways to design around the claims or just invalidate them. You would be surprised how often we succeed.

Look at cell phones, there are numerous patents on cell phones, apps, communication technologies, and so on. Yet, there is no lack of choice. We are buried in choice.

Also, I advise my clients to think of every way their invention can be made, including the terrible ways. Many times, the competing, non-patented product will be inferior to the patented product, yet not infringing the claims. The inferior product may just have better marketing. The consumer is usually not an expert in the field and must rely on advertising claims and dubious good reviews.

It is my opinion that patents create constant disruption and competition, which is healthy for the market; and ultimately provides better choice for the consumer. Perfect designs, like paper clips, enjoy 20 years of protection, then eventually become commodities. While imperfect designs will be exploited by the competition, with design-arounds and improvements. And there are very few perfect designs.

Finally, I mainly work with small companies that wish to compete against large companies. They do not wish to be the free R & D lab for the larger company. A patent may allow a small company to compete against the overwhelming resources of a large company; hopefully creating jobs and wealth at the same time. It is still a very hard path that few can navigate. Patents are just one tool to make business a little easier.

I deal with patents day in, day out. With millions of patents issued and many more examined, there is bound to be some real stinkers. Whether or not a patent is allowed depends on the examiner assigned to the case, the art unit (technology category), the prior art patents the examiner finds (they define the outer limits of the patent claims), the skill of the attorney/agent, the name of the company seeking a patent, and, of course, the amount of money thrown at the examination.

Some examiner are push-overs. Some examiners are impressed with the assignee name (Google, Apple, and such), and may be more likely to allow. Some examiners seem to take pleasure in rejecting the application, even if they cannot find appropriate prior art.

There is variability in the quality of examination. However, there are methods to correct mistakes at the Patent Office. I am often involved with post-grant review procedures to invalidate issued patents. If a patent is truly overly-broad, then it should be possible to find prior art somewhere in the world that can be used to invalidate the patent.

The presumption that a patent is valid only applies in court. There is no presumption during reexamination or an inter partes review process. In fact, it is very difficult to defend a patent in post grant review. The patent owner is very likely to lose its patent or find it severely weakened.

Also, someone here has pointed out an example or two of terrible patents. Even though issued, these patents could be near useless, because the claims are extremely narrow and are easily designed around, if anyone cares to even do this. Most of these patents are like bees without stingers - still buzzing and spinning around, but harmless and soon to die.

One more thing, it irritates me when people in the software world say the patent system is broken and should be abolished, when they may just be looking at it from just a software point of view. There are many true innovations in every field, and at least a few copycats that are waiting for a product to hit big, so they can create a duplicate completing product. Look at the X-Hose getting knocked-off by PocketHose. There should be some protection for those who have created something novel.

You can argue that some people would create innovations without the patent system, which is true; but there are many more who would not bother without the prospect of patent protection. One more benefit of the patent system is that, in exchange for a patent, the applicant must fully disclose how to make and use the invention. Instead of sitting in some notebook or Word file, the information is shared. The maintenance fee system (where a patent owner must pay a fee at 3.5, 7.5, and 11.5 years to keep its patent in force) weeds out many patents, as the owner decides that it is no longer worth the money to keep it alive.