Prior art database
From en.swpat.org
This article documents a non-solution or a dud.
For information of the danger of supporting these, see duds and non-solutions. For a list, see Category:Non-solutions.
One way to invalidate a patent is to find prior art - an example of the idea that pre-dates the patent. By publishing non-patented ideas as widely as possible, maybe we can make it easier to find prior art for the purpose of invalidating patents.
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[edit] Limits to effectiveness
- Sometimes there is no prior art.
- Sometimes the prior art only eliminates part of the patent. The patent holder will be permitted to redraft their patent to keep the non duplicated parts while avoiding the prior art you've found.
- This can backfire if the database is public because patent applicants could use the database to just about avoid being similar to the prior art, so they won't have to worry about their patent being invalidated.
[edit] Defensive publication
Defensive publication is the idea that by documenting and publishing an idea, you can prevent the future problem that someone else will patent that idea.
For example, in 2004, a paper was published on "Precise detection of memory leaks".[1] In 2007, a patent application was filed at the USPTO for a follow-on invention.[2] The 2007 application cited the 2004 paper as being part of the state-of-the-art which is extended by the patent application. The authors of the 2004 paper have no connection to the authors of the 2007 patent application. Ironically, one of the authors of the 2004 paper is a prominent member of anti-swpat group FFII.
[edit] Related pages on en.swpat.org
- Duds and non-solutions
- Invalidating the most harmful - searches for prior art are sometimes used in this targeted way
[edit] External links
- Public Domain Ideas, and their wiki's category for Computer Software, Algorithms, and Data Processing
- Defensive Publications - a project of Linux Defenders
- FFII's analysis of the problems of defensive publication
- A study by David Martin showing that trolls do patent around published ideas (published patents) in the USA
- Linux Foundation discussion of how to implement this technically
[edit] References
- ↑ http://camanis.blogspot.com/2009/08/someone-wants-to-patent-three-year-old.html
- ↑ http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220080294853%22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20080294853&RS=DN/20080294853
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