[Discuss] The America Invents Act

[Matthew Gillen]

On 09/28/2011 03:10 PM, Hsuan-Yeh Chang wrote:
> I also think you miss my point.  By filing a patent application and
> getting it published, your Examiner friend would have citations to
> reject late comer's claims.  Should the open source community started
> to file patent applications in the few decades, there would have
> sufficient number of references to knock out those what you called
> "obvious" patents.  Unfortunately, the open source community has been
> playing ostrich and willfully disregarded the facts that, today, they
> can get a patent application published and serve for prior art
> purposes for less than $200 of official fee (if less than 100
> pages)...  If the open source developer is rich enough to pursue a
> patent, then he/she is free to grant or donate a non-exclusive
> license of his/her patent right to the community.  Without having any
> patent rights handy, the open source community will forever be a
> victim.

http://www.richardspatentlaw.com/faq/how-much-does-a-patent-cost/
Avg. cost of filing a patent: $8,548
 for complex computer patent: $13,684

(there are more references like that:
 http://www.inventionstatistics.com/Patent_Cost.html
)

No one should have to file for a patent simply to establish prior art.
It was my understanding that prior art could come from any source; it
didn't have to be from documents the patent office manages.  If the
patent office only considers previous patent applications when looking
at prior art, then I think the system is even more broken than I
originally suspected...

Matt