Richard Thanks for that. (Puts a new twist on the phrase "patently obvious") :-(
Mally ----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard Bytheway" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "FlightGear developers discussions" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, February 16, 2004 9:11 AM Subject: Patents [OT] (Was: RE: [Flightgear-devel] XML SCripting) > -----Original Message----- > From: Mally [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: 13 February 2004 7:12 pm > To: FlightGear developers discussions > Subject: Re: [Flightgear-devel] XML SCripting > > > > You may not be a patent lawyer, but that's a convincing > sounding explanation > of > > the legal position. > > PS. I'm just wondering if you have any thoughts on my earlier > question, i.e. > whether what's being patented has to be something non-obvious? > > Mally > > > I think the wording is something along the lines of: "The invention must be non-obvious to a person with experience in the field" Since the patent examiner should be an expert in the field (that is why they emply scientists and engineers, not high-school dropouts) the invention should be no-obvious to them. However, in the real world, the patent office cannot afford to employ an expert in every field, nor the time or money to consult an expert, so the examiner "does their best". The result is that you can push just about anything through if you try hard enough. There was a comment on the /. discussion on this subject that the examiners have a quota of patents applications to process each week, so there is little incentive to dig too deep. I hope this is not the case, but it might be. Richard _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel --- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.588 / Virus Database: 372 - Release Date: 14/02/04 _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel
