Dear paul,
There may be some truth to your allegation. This isn't the first time we are confronted with clever uses of the deficiencies in the USPTO methods for evaluating what is acceptable and what not. As a mathematician by training I am really appalled by this, we because we are rapidly nearing the threshold where in fact areas of mathematical theory and applied mathematics are being harvested for patentable items. We should draw the line at concrete algorithms, but conceptual visualizations which are so general that homomorphic conceptual formalizations may also be captured by the scope of the patent may actually lead to intellectual property ownership of mathematical theories which are public domain knowledge. This is despicable. Regards Milton Ponson GSM: +297 747 8280 PO Box 1154, Oranjestad Aruba, Dutch Caribbean Project Paradigm: A structured approach to bringing the tools for sustainable development to all stakeholders worldwide by creating ICT tools for NGOs worldwide and: providing online access to web sites and repositories of data and information for sustainable development This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please notify the system manager. This message contains confidential information and is intended only for the individual named. If you are not the named addressee you should not disseminate, distribute or copy this e-mail. ________________________________ From: Paul Houle <[email protected]> To: Linked Data community <[email protected]>; [email protected] Sent: Thursday, June 14, 2012 11:06 AM Subject: Does this patent application affect named graphs? Hi, I was checking out a rather good patent search engine and was surprised to see this http://ip.com/pat/US20100223224 A few years ago I did a patent search for things that could have come out of the Cyc project and was a bit surprised to find that I couldn't find any. It looks like somebody is trying to patent microtheories about 16 years after Guha's thesis presented microtheories as an extension of FOL. The language in the patent application looks pretty broad to me, but I've got no idea if it will hold up.
