Description and Review of Patent Issues

A patent, in law, is a document issued by a government conferring some special right or privilege. In the United States, the term is restricted to patents for inventions granted under federal statute. The specific attributes of novelty for which a patent is sought are called claims; thus, a patent can have several claims. The patent gives the inventor the exclusive privilege of using a certain process or of making, using, and selling a specific product or device for a specified period of time.

• Patent Infringement
  Once a patent is granted, issues of infringement, scope, or any other questions related to the grant are within the jurisdiction of the U.S. district courts. Infringement consists of knowingly and wrongfully making, using, or selling someone else's patented invention.

• Types of Patents: In the U.S., there are mainly three types of patents:
  • Utility Patents: These are for new and useful processes, machines, articles of manufacture, or compositions of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof.
  • Design Patents: These protect the unique visual qualities of a product (ornamental design).
  • Plant Patents: These are granted for new varieties of plants that have been asexually reproduced.
• Patent Term:
  • Utility patents generally last for 20 years from the date of filing the application, provided maintenance fees are paid on time.
  • Design patents have a term of 15 years from the date of grant (for patents filed on or after May 13, 2015).
  • Plant patents last for 20 years from the date of filing.
• Claims: The claims are critical parts of the patent document because they define the boundaries of the patent protection. They specify what exactly is being protected, and infringement occurs when another party makes, uses, sells, or imports something that falls within these claims without permission.
• Patent Process:
  • Filing: An application must be filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), which includes a detailed description of the invention, drawings (if applicable), and claims.
  • Examination: The patent office examines the application to determine if the invention is novel, non-obvious, and useful. This can involve back-and-forth communication ("office actions") between the applicant and the examiner.
  • Grant: If approved, the patent is granted, and the invention is officially recognized as intellectual property with legal protection.
• Enforcement: The patent holder is responsible for enforcing their rights. If they believe someone is infringing on their patent, they can take legal action, which might lead to stopping the infringement, receiving damages, or both.
• International Considerations: While a U.S. patent only provides protection within the U.S., inventors can seek patent protection in other countries through international treaties like the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) for a more global coverage.

Understanding these aspects can help in navigating the complexities of patent law, whether you're an inventor, a business owner, or simply interested in intellectual property rights.

In general, a patent affords protection against infringement only within the jurisdiction of the government by which it is issued; therefore, inventors should secure a patent in every country in which they want protection.Patent laws have been enacted in most nations; the most important international treaty applicable to patents is the International Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property. An important issue in EP-related patent law is software patents. Generally, software patents do not cover the entire program; instead, they cover algorithms and techniques. A software patent eligibility problem may arise when the algorithms and techniques mentioned in a patent application have already been formulated and are being used independently by other programmers at the time the application is filed.

• Software Patents
  Some argue that the patent system is at odds with the nature of software development. Present computer programs contain thousands of algorithms and techniques; each could be considered patentable, and some are patented.
  
  • Apple vs. Microsoft
    For example, Apple Computer was sued because its HyperCard program was alleged to violate patent number 4,736,308. In simplified terms, that patent protects a product that lets the user scroll through a database displaying selected parts of each line of text.
    Separately, scrolling and display functions are ubiquitous parts of graphical programming, but combining them led Apple to allegedly infringe upon patent number 4,736,308. Apple, in turn, sued Microsoft for allegedly infringing on the look and feel of what it claims is its invention of graphical rendering of information on a computer display.

The judicial basis for software patent eligibility is found in the 1981 case of Diamond v. Diehr, in which the Court said that a patent "could be granted for an industrial process that was controlled by certain computer algorithms." Consequently, the PTO has used this case as a precedent for allowing patents on algorithms and techniques. The PTO's stance on patents for algorithms and techniques has increased the granting of software patents.
Diamond versus Diehr, 450 U.S. 175 (1981), was a 1981 U.S. Supreme Court decision which held that controlling the execution of a physical process, by running a computer program did not preclude patentability of the invention as a whole. The high court reiterated its earlier holdings that mathematical formulas in the abstract could not be patented, but it held that the mere presence of a software element did not make an otherwise patent-eligible machine or process un-patentable. Diehr was the third member of a trilogy of Supreme Court decisions on the patent-eligibility of computer software related inventions.
In the next lesson you will learn about e-commerce privacy and confidentiality issues.

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Copyright Trademarks Patents - Quiz