[Patents] Re: [Patents] Letter to UK Patent Office

[Nick Fleming marmalade@x-stream.co.uk]

Ed Avis Wrote :

> Mr Watson has said he'd prefer not to be swamped with further
> messages, so it's probably polite _not_ to add his details to the
> 'write to me' web page.  Unless the UK Patent Office changes its
> policy, of course :-)
> 

    Unlike some others, Jeff Watson does at least to reply
to his E-mails (thankyou ! :-) although he must be getting tired
of everyone saying the same thing over and over by now (i.e. No
Software Patents Please.), especially as he can't do much until
the Software Patents Directive is released. I have to say that
in general, Jeff and his staff have been extremely helpful in
answering my own bizarre questions over the last six months
or so. Here's a quick summary of some of the replies that I think
may be of interest. (Note : not all From Mr Watson)
In fairness to the UK patent office, I should point out that
these are probably not official UK policy - ok ?

"To begin with, it would be wrong to suggest that the patenting of
software is new.  The UK Patent Office has always granted patents for
software-related inventions, provided that there is a technical advance in
the invention"

This isnt really anything to write home about, as for most of these
inventions software is provided as part of the overall description of
the invention which is required to obtain a patent. However, the
wording here is interesting, as it implies that pure-software patents
HAVE been granted despire a previous e-mail to me stating that this
is not possible (i.e. you cant patent a compiler).

"A recent survey suggested that roughly
fifteen (15) percent of granted UK patents are software-related. "

This was news to me, and having done some searching on databases
across Europe, I think there is more patents granted on software than
most people realise. So why is everyone not being sued left right
and center ? Well, despite the increase in patenting of software,
companies are NOT renewing patent licences when they have to. 
Im still trying to figure this one out, but I think that it is due to
the fact that because the software industry moves so fast, many
'technologies' are peceived to be obsolete, and so deemed not
worth renewing. This is good news for free software, as it means
that even if the restrictions on software patents are lifted and
there is an outbreak of patenting the LONG term effect will
be lots more free software as (a) patents will expire and (b)
many patents will not be renewed. (No I havent gone
mad, I still think software patents are a bad idea !)

"Moreover, a recent appeal decision has held that it is possible to patent
an invention in terms of the program, either by itself, or as a record on a
carrier.  "

Interesting, and one which I've already pointed out the flaw in to
the Patent office - I wonder if they'll pass it on to the Commission?
The flaw is that all you do is take each item you wish to patent,
turn it into a program, and patent each program separately.
I asked for the details of this and got the following response:

"There are actually two very similar decisions, both issued by
the Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office.  The numbers of the
decisions are: T 1173/97 and T 0935/97.  Both are available in PDF format
on the EPO web site - www.european-patent-office.org."

Told you they were helpful ! :-)

".  In terms of the prior art, you have observed that a large
amount of it is not readily available in a searchable format. 
This is now less of a problem than it might once have
been because as more and more  software-related patents are granted,
we are gradually building up our own search database
Furthermore, the UK has a system of early publication that
allows interested parties to make observations on a patent application
before it is examined in the Office.  This provision, which has
been in place since the 1977 Act came into force, enables anyone
to notify us of prior art that we might otherwise have missed"

I don't want to comment on this, except to say that 
this does seem to confirm Greg Aharonian's opinion that
most patent searchs are done purely on a database basis. Why
is this a problem ? Because there is no reliable way to do a search
and cover all possibilities. For example, do a search on 'pull down menu"
and "pop-up menu". You'll probably get different results, even though
they use essentially the same technology.  

Finally...

"Another important point that emerged from our conference was the need
for clarity. With this in mind I suggest that any variations between the
general patent systems and those applied to software should be
minimised "

Still think the message is getting through folks ?

Regards,

Nick F.