Posted by Cheryl Milone on Tue, Jul 27, 2010 @ 01:36 PM
I applaud Rebecca Burn Callander’s post on Wikilitigation and the insights Ms. Callander offers on the use of crowdsourced evidence to shed light on the accuracy of medical research. The circuitous and expensive path of litigation would have been the alternative, subjecting the public to a decision on important medical topics to a battle of the experts. The risk here was not for Mr. Singh alone but for the public in need of access to accurate medical data. On a broader level, the public subsidizes the current legal system in both the U.K. and U.S. so the public pays in multiple ways.
Clear and efficient analysis is what is needed to provide accurate information to the public on topics subjected to litigation. The personal interests of parties are regularly served by the machine that makes up the legal system - attorneys, experts, consultants, judges and service providers supporting these components. These stakeholders generally are compensated based on the continuation of a legal dispute, not on its settlement. As such, the incentives to serve the public and provide justice as a public policy basis are misaligned with the stakeholders responsible for realizing these policies.
In this litigation, the risk to an individual and the public was great enough to spur public action. And the result is dramatic in providing evidence that becomes incontrovertible, as it is the aggregation of knowledge from everyone with an interest in the topic. The aggregation of knowledge is greater than that of any one individual. When the aggregate answer is clear, the power of providing certainty becomes as important as the answer itself.
Whenever an answer is knowable if enough people are asked and the same set of people is burdened by a failure to uncover the right answer, asking everyone would seem to be a natural evolution. Hence, I believe that Wikilitigation is not only going to survive but it will be the dominant form of input from an increasingly sophisticated public. The notion of citizen’s review is discussed in every branch of government from those agencies, which grant rights to citizens to the legal system, which adjudicates those rights.
One excellent example is the grant and adjudication of patent rights. A patent is, in essence, a description of technology as of a certain date (in the U.S., the date is called the invention date). The determination of whether to grant a patent is based in part on research about whether the description of technology is in an earlier dated publication. Courts later review the same question, and litigants in a patent dispute further research the earlier publications. While the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office does high quality work, its resources are limited to fully research this evidence, which can be publicly available documents in any language from anywhere in the world. The burden on the public for improperly granted patents is the payment of monopoly pricing for products and systems covered by the patents.
Article One Partners, which I founded in November 2008, provides the opportunity to the public to weigh in on these questions based on a platform that crowdsources this evidence. An incentive is added to the platform so that researchers are compensated for uncovering premier evidence. In this way, the public can weigh in on patents and correct an improper grant thereby providing savings to the public.
This takes the goal of making the court accessible to the public a step further, by compensating the public for their efforts – in effect monetizing a public good.
In the same manner as the publicwas given clarity about the efficacy of medical claims in the chiropractic field, public input on scientific research underlying patents can support the proper scope of some patents which provides litigants with the evidence needed to correct improper grants.
The community of Article One Partners provides a valuable service along the lines of Wikilitigation in the patent industry. We invite members of the public interested in pursuing these goals to join our efforts at www.ArticleOnePartners.com. While the evidence provided cannot definitely provide an answer on patents, just as the litigation against Mr. Singh continued past the revelation of the public information, it can drive settlement of litigation and enable the parties to proceed more efficiently.
Posted by David DiGiammarino on Thu, Jul 22, 2010 @ 09:59 AM
One of our founding principles at Article One Partners is the belief that the wisdom of a crowd can often outweigh the performance of individuals or small teams. A crowd helps you reach the right people, and can compile far more information than any one person. We have found, time and time again, that asking the world to submit patent validity evidence means better and faster results.
This phllosophy is called crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing is the act of outsourcing tasks -- which are traditionally performed by an employee or contractor -- to a crowd or community, through an open call.
It's working with patent research. We've seen it work with an encyclopedia. But what about a movie?
This year, we're going to find out. YouTube (and Google), Ridley Scott and Kevin MacDonald have teamed up to bring the world the first ever crowdsourced movie -- and you can participate.
The recording date will be this Saturday (July 24, 2010) around the world. Grab your phone, camera, or webcam and take a video! Anyone can submit. If your video is included, you'll be listed as a co-director and possibly even get invited to its premiere at Sundance.
Take a look at this overview:
Want to learn more? Head over to the "Life in a Day" YouTube Channel or read the FAQ.
Posted by David DiGiammarino on Tue, Jul 13, 2010 @ 04:16 PM
The Article One team is proud to congratulate one of our Researchers, known as "Specialist", on winning our Study related to a social networking patent.
Specialist submitted evidence (known as "prior art") that can show the patent, owned by WhoGlue, to be invalid.
Specialist is a great role model for those who may not have much experience in a patent's area, but want to dive in:
“Most of the Patent Studies I’ve worked on, I had little to no direct experience with," says Specialist, "I think just generally being able to understand the text of potential prior art and how it relates to the questioned patent was most important.”
How She Searched
Specialist hails from the San Francisco Bay area where she is a Ph.D. candidate in a Bioengineering Program. She also has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering. Specialist says that she is used to searching for papers because she is in graduate school.
Article One, however, was her introduction to patents. When choosing which Studies to participate in, Specialist looks for subject matter that she has experience with, or something that is general enough to allow her to be reasonably successful.
Google Patents and Google Scholar are Specialist’s preferred research tools, and she notes that the Wayback Machine has come in handy a few times. Specialist likes being able to work on patent searches on her own schedule and enjoys that she can do the research simply using her laptop.
When conducting research for an AOP Study, Specialist’s strategy has been mainly to determine good keywords for searching. At times, she has had to use very different keywords to find the patents than are available in the questioned patent.
Aside from the Social Network Study, Specialist was also very involved in the Studies on the patents of "Method for Starting and Stopping an Engine" and "Automobile with a Stop/Start System". She notes that she had to use some interesting search terms in order to find good prior art for those Studies.
Her Advice to Current and Future Researchers
To current Article One Researchers, Specialist recommends being very organized. “Keep copies of every potential prior art. Sometimes it is helpful to look for art that is not ‘prior’ and check those references.”
Specialist also notes that she was pleasantly surprised to share in the Article One 2009 profit sharing bonus despite only having participated with Article One for a few months prior to distribution. Regarding the profit sharing program, in which the most active AOP researchers share about 5% of the company’s net profit, Specialist says, “I think it gives some incentive for those who do a lot of research, but haven’t won a Study.”
To future Article One Researchers out there, Specialist says, “Go for it. I think a lot people have enough lay knowledge to be able to participate in some type of Study. You don’t need any specialized equipment; just the internet, some time, and a little imagination. You may not get the top prize, but you’re bound to get something out of it.”
Through her research with Article One, Specialist says, “I’ve learned a great deal about patents and the need for patent reform. It is also pretty cool to know that I could be contributing to some big decisions being made.”
---
Register as a Researcher for Article One Partners. It's free and easy.
Join the community and get paid. You could earn up to $50,000 for your research.
Posted by David DiGiammarino on Mon, Jul 12, 2010 @ 11:42 AM
In November of 2008, we launched the Article One Partners website, enabling a whole new way of doing patent validity research.
Today, we are excited to announce the redesign of our website, complete with our new logo. Our new design and logo are based on input from our community, professional designers, and the Article One Team. Check out some screenshots below to get an idea of the improvements.
New Logo:
Previous:
New Website Design:
Previous:
The goal of our new design is to present our content in a simple way which is easy to understand and to make our platform more accessible.
For example, we now have pages that specifically address who uses Article One Partners. You can learn how you can earn money as a Researcher, or receive patent validity research from around the world as a client.
Let us know what you think in the comments.
Posted by David DiGiammarino on Fri, Jul 09, 2010 @ 08:37 AM
Recently, I was looking at a great museum of obscure patents, compiled by Gene Quinn of IP Watchdog. These patents range from absurd (but believable) to mind-boggling (and unbelievable).
One of the patents that is a bit on the 
absurd side is the "Pest Death Ray" (pictured) that vaporizes insect with a blast of radiation. Yes, radiation. Are pests are ever really that annoying?
Others that are mind-boggling include the "Homeopathic X-ray" where "the patient and health care provider entangle their finger/thumb O-rings and then hover them over the part of the patients body that needs to be imaged." Somehow hovering o-ringed fingers over your body will produce an X-ray, apparentely by electromagnetic fields.
If you're wondering how this patent got issued, you're not alone. Gene Quinn wrote, "this one absolutely must fall into the WHAT WAS THE EXAMINER THINKING category." The interesting part is that the examiner had a good head on his shoulders. It was the system that allowed this patent to be issued. From Gene Quinn:
As it turns out, one of my close personal friends was the supervising examiner in the Art Group that issued this patent. As you can probably imagine I have had many conversations about this particular patent with him. What I picked up on when I first wrote about the patent was one particular part of the invention, but the main part of the invention is a diagnostic tool. The patent examiner, a fellow that I am told was extremely technically sophisticated, did not personally believe that this invention would work. He issued appropriate rejections and then the inventor submitted affidavits of so-called experts to say that it did work.
The patent examiner is legally required to take the word of the inventor when affadavits are filed, so he did what he had to do by law. Unfortunately, that just makes for a poor patent.
A final example from IP Watchdog's museum is one of poor quality: Better Mouse Trap. Yes, for real, a better mousetrap. Gene points out that "a search of the Patent Office online database shows that since 1976 some 44 patents have been granted with the term 'mouse trap' in the title." It's doubtful that this patent is truly novel, compared to all the past patents out there.
There are over a dozen other obscure patents in IPWatchdog's museum. It's worth taking a look.
Posted by David DiGiammarino on Tue, Jul 06, 2010 @ 04:04 PM
At Article One Partners, we are excited to begin July by teaming up with Intellogist. In a blog post last week, Intellogist mentioned how Article One and Intellogist are complimentary halves of the "prior art searching puzzle"; we could not agree more.
Intellogist has a variety of resources to help those who search for prior art, such as information about patent search systems, databases and other possible sources of both patent and non-patent literature. As you can imagine, these tools can help you refine your own strategy for submitting prior art to our Studies, or requests for research.
We invite our AOP community to take advantage of these resources and tools available on Intellogist. To begin, read through their community-supported Best Practices articles and their Intellogist Reports. Share your own knowledge by contributing to the Wiki articles and discussion forum.
And to our friends from Intellogist, welcome to Article One. Seize this opportunity and show your expertise by responding to our Studies – where you can win thousands for your research. Sign up with Article One to learn how rewarding it is to be part of the AOP community.
Article One Partners Active Studies:
Provide patent research and get paid.
Intellogist Resources:
Get a leg up on patent research.
- Intellogist Reports - Carefully researched, highly detailed reviews of patent and non-patent information systems.
- Interactive Patent Coverage Map - Helpful if your searches are directed to patent collections from a specific country. By clicking on the country of interest, you can view a list of the various databases and search systems that provide coverage there.
- Best Practices Articles - Best Practices Wiki articles exist for the community to share both common wisdom, and valuable insights, about the prior art searching process
- Discussion Forum - Discuss all things related to prior art searching and a great place to connect with the Intellogist community
Posted by Greg McKallagat on Fri, Jul 02, 2010 @ 01:21 PM
Researcher Michael O'Keeffe (Riskmentor) was the winning Researcher for the AUTO 442 Study.
Michael is an Irish biotechnology expert who currently divides his time visiting family in Ireland, the UK, Spain and Canada. Michael works as a freelance patent searcher and Japanese to English translator, and he has lived in La Rioja in the North of Spain for the past three years.
In the past, Michael worked as a patent examiner and on the World Patent Index database with Thomson Scientific. To aid his research efforts, Michael has a B.Sc. in Biology with a major in Genetics from Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, a M.Sc. in Biotechnology from Okayama University in Japan and a Diploma in Japanese from Osaka University. Michael's primary language is English, but he also speaks Japanese and Spanish fluently, which allows him to research in all three of these languages. Michael says that researching for AOP Studies is "challenging and, when successful, rewarding."
Below Michael kindly shares the factors which led him to be so successful in the AUTO 442 Study:
The task of finding prior art on 442 was a natural one for me for a number of reasons.
- I remember the start-stop technology in a VW my brother-in-law owned in the mid 1980s.
- The start-stop technology was in use in city buses in Japan from the late 1990s when I lived there.
- I know my way around patent databases such as that of the USPTO, Esp@ce, JPO and World Patent Index (WPI) as I worked on WPI for 12 years.
- I can read and translate Japanese and while others can too, using my knowledge to find unpublished [in English] Japanese references adds depth to any patent study.
To succeed in solving an AOP patent prior art Study requires knowledge of the technology, an understanding of patents and a lot of determination to track down key references, but an ounce of inspiration or 'I-saw-that-somewhere-before' goes a long way.
Michael offers the following advice to the AOP community: "Read the patent carefully and then dig deep in the patent and non-patent databases to find relevant prior art. Talk to someone who knows the field and, if successful, share the reward with them!"
Are you an Advisor who wants to be featured in the Article One blog and newsletter? Click here.
Posted by Cheryl Milone on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 @ 09:22 AM
The IP world is overflowing with news and reactions on the Supreme Court's Bilski decision this past Monday. I wanted to take a moment to highlight the analyses of two highly acclaimed IP blogs, and offer my own thoughts. A quote from each follows -- but both are worth reading in their entirety.
Gene Quinn, of IPWatchDog, writes:
Today, after a wait of nearly 8 months the Supreme Court has seemingly got it right, at least based on early analysis. In doing away with the machine or transformation test as the sole test for determining whether an invention is patentable subject matter the Supreme Court has kicked open the door and will not allow it to be closed on new technologies and innovations that we cannot today imagine.
Dennis Crouch, of Patently-O, writes:
Business as Usual: In general, the [Bilski] opinion offers no clarity or aid for those tasked with determining whether a particular innovation falls within Section 101. The opinion provides no new lines to be avoided. Rather, the outcome from the decision might be best stated as "business as usual."
Business Methods: Section 101 does not categorically exclude business methods from patentability.
Software: Although the court expressly refused to rule on the patentability of software, it appears that software will largely remain patentable.
These two posts highlight how the decision maintains the status quo. In my view, while greater clarity on the standard for patentable subject matter would assist the USPTO and the private sector in evaluating their rights and obligations, the decision is better than some expected.
The elimination of business method patents as a class of eligible subject matter would have called into question not only business method patents but also software patents. The ripple effect of such an outcome would have been dramatic. The notion of categorizing classes of patentable subject matter to exclude business methods or software directs the patent system in the wrong direction, away from meritorious inventions which can be evaluated on the basis of advancing the knowledge of the public with previously unknown inventions.
While areas of innovation change over time, from tangible (e.g., during the industrial revolution) to intangible products and services such as software that drive our economy today, the ideal patent system would reward deserving innovation. The public is best served with this opportunity for patent protection and a reduction in the burden of premium pricing and other societal costs of a patent system where patent quality needs to improve. My hope is for clarity on standard and better access to prior art by the USPTO through organizations like Peer-To-Patent.
I also was struck by the following passage in the decision as it applies to the Article One community of researchers.
"This Age puts the possibility of innovation in the hands of more people and raises new difficulties for the patent law. With ever more people trying to innovate and thus seeking patent protections for their inventions, the patent law faces a great challenge in striking a balance between protecting inventors and not granting monopolies over procedures that others would discover by independent, creative application of general principals. Nothing in this opinion should be read to take a position on where that balance ought to be struck."
Bilski v. Kappos (2010), p10 [download]
The recognition of the patent system as a living system providing rights and obligations that eventually flow to the public is tremendous. Article One's vision is that the public, which both benefits and is burdened by the current system, should be asked to participate in the decision of whether an innovation is worthy of a patent grant.
Posted by David DiGiammarino on Mon, Jun 28, 2010 @ 08:06 AM
Today is the final day of the Supreme Court's term, which means we should be hearing about the decision of Bilski v. Kappos. (Unless, of course, they push it until next term.) The issue at hand is the patentability of business methods.
SCOTUS will be live-blogging the issuance of decisions starting at 9:45a ET. Until then, here are four posts about Bilski v. Kappos to keep you busy:
IPWatchdog.com - Bilski and Software Patents: A Programmers Perspective
Unlike many of the visitors and contributors on this site, I am not a lawyer. I am a programmer who found this blog while chasing links across the Internet looking for information on software patents and what has now become one of the most anticipated Supreme Court decisions ever; Bilski v. Kappos. That was almost eight months ago at a time when I held what is probably a common view of software patents among programmers. Specifically, that they are immoral, unfair, and restrictive to innovation and creativity. I have since found that things are not as black and white as they appear and I'd like to share with you the problems as I see them, from a programmer's point of view. Read more...
Ruminations from IP Strategist - Happy Bilski Day!
As with probably all patent folks, I am looking forward to seeing what The Supremes have to say about business method patents. No matter what happens, we can be assured that the press will be full of all kinds of statements like “the end is near” for patents. In reality, Bilski is not a very big deal, and effects only patents that are poorly written or that cover inventions that really shouldn’t be patentable. Read more...
SCOTUS - A Preview of Big Monday
And then there’s Bilski,
the case that will consider the validity of business-method patents. These sorts of patents — Amazon’s one-click checkout and Priceline’s reverse auction represent two examples — have been kicking around for over a decade, ever since the Federal Circuit’s State Street decision, which expanded the scope of processes that could be patented. The high court must now determine whether such swaths of modern business activity deserve patent protections (thereby opening the door to infringement lawsuits) or belong in the public domain (depriving their inventors of monopoly profits.) Read more...
Patently O - Bilski, Kenny Rogers, and Supreme Court Rule 46
Kenny Rogers’ hit song The Gambler provides some wise strategic advice, valid not only in cards and but also in law and perhaps in life generally: If “fold ’em” is an option, sometimes it is the best one. Supreme Court Rule 46 on “Dismissing Cases” provides petitioners in Supreme Court cases the opportunity to “fold ’em,” and in the days remaining before the Supreme Court delivers an opinion in its Bilski v. Kappos case, the most puzzling question in the case has become this: Why won’t the petititoners in Bilski fold? Read more...
Posted by Greg McKallagat on Tue, Jun 22, 2010 @ 03:21 PM
Researcher Yossi Shain (yshain) lives in Israel and has been involved in the semiconductor industry for the past fifteen years. For the bulk of that time, he was involved in R&D commercializing parallel processing arrays based on content addressable memory, for video and 3d graphics. In his current capacity as IPR manager of Neonode Technologies, Yossi works with Soquel Group, who referred him to Article One. Yossi has authored several patents, including novel methods for addition and subtraction using content addressable memory cells.
Yossi is a liberal-arts enthusiast (and amateur tennis player), who arrived at engineering in the course of his work. He attended the School of Visual Arts, Juilliard, and City University of New York, before he began drafting patent applications for a patent attorney in 1996. Two years into that job, he was asked by an inventor to join his semiconductor start-up as a technical writer. As he became proficient in the company's technology, Yossi began giving technology seminars to engineers at large multinational corporations and was invited several times to guest lecture in the Tel Aviv University MSEE program. Yossi then joined Neomagic and became a software engineer and in-house guru for porting algorithms to the company's unique hardware, eventually managing a team that developed a 3d graphics library for the company's processor. Two years ago Yossi began working for Neonode, a small mobile phone start-up in Stockholm, Sweden, where he is IPR manager.
When conducting research for Article One Studies, Yossi's familiarity with the technology landscape directs his search. He is very involved in mobile handset hardware, from SoC chips to touch screens. Yossi says, "Article One had a great idea to apply a social network model to harness the wealth of experience and knowledge out there and I am happy to be a part of this. Actually, it's the first social network scheme that I have seen successfully applied to deriving tangible results in any field. I am confident this model has exciting potential in many fields and look forward to watching how it develops across different industries."