Konomi Takeshita; John Chester; Jonathan Abrams; Dave Amels
On July 13th, 1836, the U.S. Patent Office granted patent number one, a railroad wheel. Since this event, millions of patents have been registered via a complex system which requires deep knowledge of the strategies which will best protect the intellectual property of the inventor.
This process is best navigated by an attorney specializing in patent law. At our January meeting, we were fortunate to have U.S. Patent Attorney Konomi Takeshita present an overview of the process, describing its pathways and pitfalls.
The meeting began with John Chester providing an outline of the basic structure of a patent, and the significance of each section. Starting with a descriptive title and the names of the inventors, the document continues with a filing date, a classification describing which category of patent is being pursued, an abstract describing the invention and then a detailed description. References, figures and descriptions of the figures are followed by the claims, which delineate the idea and describe the construction of the object being patented. One challenge of the document is to be descriptive enough to protect the inventors' ideas, while not allowing competitors enough information to easily construct the device themselves.
Ms. Takeshita continued to describe the different categories of patents: utility (for hardware and software), design (for ornaments and "appearance") and plants (for asexually created plants). The terms trademark, servicemark and copyright were defined, and the symbols for these terms were clarified, as they indicate whether the invention is Federally registered or claimed using "commonlaw" rules. She then described the patent application process, and warned of the expense this pursuit may incur. Foreign patents were discussed, as well as issues involving infringement from the perspective of plaintiff and defendant.
Dave Amels, a pioneer in digital modeling of analog devices, advised the audience to make a claim as broad as possible, stating that the U.S. Patent Office often leaves patent holders to resolve conflicting claims themselves. He relayed cautionary tales based on his experience of selling Bomb Factory's software to Digidesign and protecting his newest ideas from infringement as he prepares to debut new products at an important trade show.
Mr. Chester showed several patents which appeared to predict PCM digital audio, and explained how the patents were issued decades before the supporting technology (A/D converters and recorders) was good enough to use for digital music recording. Two decades elapsed from the issue date of the definitive PCM patent (1941) to the first commercial use of PCM technology to transmit telephone speech in the US (1962), and a third decade elapsed before digital music recording became a reality.
Mr. Abrams displayed the patent for a Pro Tools TDM system, and the presenters dissected the document for all in attendance. The audience was lively, often asking pertinent questions and contributing anecdotes and additional words of experience.
Review by: Noah Simon
