Patent & IP blog, discussing recent news & scholarship on patents, IP theory & innovation.
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Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Donald Chisum: Priority Among Competing Patent Applicants Under the America Invents Act
How will the “First Inventor to
File” provisions of the America Invents Act (AIA) impact patent applications
filed after the March 16, 2013 implementation date? Donald Chisum’s article, Priority Among Competing Patent Applicants Under the America Invents Act, utilizes a patent bar-esque hypothetical to
highlight several important features of the new legislation. Chisum begins his
article by outlining a fact pattern involving inventors A and B and the
independent steps each inventor takes to patent invention X, a protein that
controls muscle spasms.
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Adam Mossoff- The Rise and Fall of the First American Patent Thicket: The Sewing Machine War of the 1850s
Have scholars and critics misconstrued patent thickets, incremental innovation, and patent trolling as modern phenomena? In The Rise and Fall of the First American Patent Thicket: The Sewing Machine War of the 1850s, Professor Adam Mossoff (George Mason University School of Law) thoroughly examines the history of the sewing machine and illustrates how these “modern” phenomena have long existed in innovation. In this article, Professor Mossoff provides an overwhelmingly informative historical study of the first American patent thicket and subsequent patent pool, discusses the importance of an in-depth historical analysis, and challenges a few widely-held assumptions.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Great Minds Don’t Always Think Alike: Patent Inflation Sparks Debate Among Scholars
A couple months ago this blog highlighted an intriguing recent article by Jonathan Masur titled Patent Inflation (original post) that presented a model for what the author has observed as a trend of expanding boundaries of patentability. Since that time, Professor Masur’s model of patent inflation has become a hot topic in patent law that has stimulated a hearty debate among three notable patent scholars. Masur’s original article has spawned two thought-provoking responses and a sur-reply. This post summarizes this captivating debate as it is unfolding at the The Yale Law Journal Online.
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Jason Rantanen & Lee Petherbridge - Toward a System of Invention Registration: The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act
Does the America Invents Act
create a process for patent amnesty? The economic ramifications of the newly
created supplemental examination process are discussed by Professors Jason Rantanen and Lee Petherbridge in their highly engaging article, Toward a System of Invention Registration: The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act.