Securing Innovation

BusinessWeek Special Report: Patent Trolls

IP — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 01:23:20 -0500

Don't miss this Special Report from BusinessWeek.

Tech Giants' New Way to Thwart Patent Suits

Frustrated by litigation costs, Microsoft, Sony, and Nokia are paying third-party patent acquirers such as RPX to fend off patent lawsuits

Slide Show: Patent Trolls' Top Targets

Apple, Sony, Dell, and Microsoft are the companies most frequently sued by so-called non-practicing entities alleging patent infringement

Acacia: The Company Tech Loves to Hate

With the most patent-infringement cases against tech giants, Acacia Research is often called a "patent troll." Inventors hail it as a savior

Debunking the 'Patent Troll' Myth

Innovation in the U.S. frequently fails to reward inventors. So-called patent trolls are evening the score

Podcast: Insurance for Patent Trolls

How to defend against patent law suits

In other news of interest to those following these topics, Gene Quinn at IP Watchdog reports that the Former Head of Patents at MSFT & IBM, Marshal Phelps, joined the Board of Directors at Article One Partners.

IPCom, Patent Trolls, Reputation Management

IP — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 19:08:37 -0500

Is there a likelihood of confusion between IP.com Inc. and IPCom GmbH & Co. KG, a German non-practicing entity, or NPE, that is sometimes called a patent troll?

The Register, a British online journal, apparently sees the potential for confusion with the similarity of names and tries to keep its readers well-informed in this report that the British courts recently found the IPCom patents invalid in the UK.

IPCom GmbH (not to be confused with IP.com) acquired a load of patents from Bosch, and has been waving them at mobile-phone companies ever since, with limited success. This time last year, Nokia complained to the EU that IPCom wasn't playing FRAND* with the patents, some of which are necessary to the GSM standard. But IPCom sees no obligation to apply FRAND restrictions, even if Bosch agreed to them.

Clear so far? In the latest round of international patent litigation, the British High Court struck down the IPCom patents, but apparently Nokia and other defendants are not off the hook, yet. There's still the unresolved matter of the $17 Billion Dollar patent infringement case on IPCom GmbH's home field in Germany.

But wait...this just in...at Bloomberg.com

IPCom German Patent Suit Against Deutsche Telekom Put on Hold

A lawsuit against Deutsche Telekom AG, Europe’s biggest phone company, was put on hold by a German court Jan. 22 until patent authorities can review the intellectual property at the heart of the dispute.

The Regional Court of Mannheim will wait for a ruling by the European Patent Office on the validity of the patent at stake, court spokesman Joachim Bock said in a Jan. 22 interview. Patent licensing company IPCom GmbH & Co. brought the suit.

The case is part of IPCom’s effort to force mobile-phone makers Nokia Oyj and HTC Corp. to pay royalties for a portfolio of mobile technology patents IPCom acquired from Robert Bosch GmbH in 2007. The patents are part of a high-speed mobile communications standard.

Nokia this month succeeded in overturning some IPCom patents in a U.K. court and lost a bid to invalidate another patent at the European Patent Office yesterday.

IPCom sued Deutsche Telekom to make it stop selling devices that IPCom claims violate rights it owns. Nokia, HTC and other device makers are supporting Deutsche Telekom against claims by IPCom in this case, Clemens-August Heusch, a Nokia attorney, said in an interview.

Thomas Empt, a spokesman for Munich-based IPCom, said the company will comment once it has reviewed the judgment.

The patent at issue has been contested by the phone makers at the European Patent Office, said Hans-Martin Lichtenthaeler, a spokesman for Bonn-based Deutsche Telekom. Deutsche Telekom is supporting them in that proceeding, he said.

The Mannheim court in December put on hold three related suits against Espoo, Finland-based Nokia and Taoyuan, Taiwan- based HTC. HTC lost another case in February, which is now pending on appeal.

"Nokia and IPCom: more fun before the EPO, but what's going on?" muses IPKat.

Here on Securing Innovation, we've blogged about this IPCom case since day one, to make it clear that our company, IP.com is NOT suing Nokia for $17.7 Billion Dollars, and to deal head-on with the likelihood of confusion with the name IPCom.

We're not the first company, and won't be the last, to use the power of the Internet, blogs, and social media for reputation management.

You've got to speak up for yourself.

In other news, from the land of the mythical patent troll, comes this bedtime story for intellectual property lawyers.

General Patent Video Hits back at ‘Patent Troll Myth’

General Patent Corp., an IP-licensing and enforcement organization, posted a video on its Web site debunking what it calls “The Myth of the Patent Troll.”

The term “Patent Troll,” first used by Peter Detkin when he was head of litigation at Intel Corp., is a pejorative term used to describe patent owners who don’t make products covered by their patents and sue others who do make products. Another term frequently used is “non-practicing entity.”

Detkin is now a vice chairman at Intellectual Ventures, a company based in Bellevue, Washington, that has amassed a large number of patents and does not itself make any products.

Suffern, New York-based General Patent, which has been a plaintiff in a number of patent-infringement actions and doesn’t manufacture products, has sometimes been called a patent troll. The General Patent video claims that corporations “infringe patents with impunity” and refers to them as “the corporate landed gentry.”

The patent troll “is just a myth,” according to the video.

In June 2009, General Patent brought former U.S. Commissioner of Patents Bruce Lehman onto its board.

Sleep tight.

Kent Displays Reflex™ LCD Tablet

IP — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 22:12:30 -0500

Kent Displays recently announced forming Improv Electronics, a new business unit focused on development and sales of consumer electronic products. The products will utilize Kent Displays revolutionary Reflex™ no power LCD technology.

The first product sold under the Improv Electronics name, the Boogie Board LCD Writing Tablet, is now available. This product is the first paperless writing tablet to utilize a pressure-sensitive Reflex LCD for the writing surface. While most other LCDs are made on glass, the Reflex LCDs used in Boogie Board tablets are made of impact-resistant, flexible plastic. They are mass produced exclusively in the U.S. on the world's first roll-to-roll line for fabrication of flexible LCDs.

Because all Reflex LCDs are reflective and bi-stable, the Boogie Board tablet requires no power to generate or retain an image, and only a small amount to erase (supplied by a small watch battery, which will execute over 50,000 erase cycles). At a retail price of $29.97 USD, the Boogie Board tablet's cost per erase is 15 times less than the per sheet cost of paper in a comparable steno notepad.

Written and graphic images are created with an included stylus or any other instrument that will apply the desired pressure (even a finger nail). Unlike traditional LCDs that have a poor response to pressure, the Boogie Board's Reflex LCD is highly responsive to variable amounts of pressure. This allows different line thicknesses to be easily created (great for sketching) and provides a writing experience very similar to paper and pencil.

Part of Kent Displays' Push Green™ initiative, the Boogie Board tablet provides a highly-effective vehicle to reduce everyday paper consumption. While most reduction strategies have focused on computer-related activities, an equally significant amount of paper is used for everyday writing tasks such as writing memos, jotting down ideas, making reminders/lists, practicing handwriting/arithmetic (young children), playing games, drawing pictures, and diagramming plays (coaches). The paperless Boogie Board tablet can be used for all these activities, replacing memo/note pads and sticky notes in the home, office, school, car and field. It also replaces chalk, magnetic and dry erase boards. Like all the above writing and drawing mediums, the Boogie Board tablet consumes no electrical energy to produce an image.

OEM versions of the Boogie Board tablet for integration into third party devices (e.g., computer keyboard) will also be sold.

Founded in 1993, Kent Displays, Inc., is a world leader in the research, development and manufacture of Reflex No Power LCDs for unique, sustainable applications including electronic skins, writing tablets, smartcards and eReaders. In October 2008, Kent Displays installed a new roll-to-roll production line at its headquarters in Kent, Ohio, U.S.A. to mass produce Reflex LCDs from rolls of plastic. The line is the first of its kind in the world and produces no waste water/chemicals and less solvent emissions than sheet-based processes. The flexibility, durability and exceptional thinness of our plastic displays, combined with no power image retention and superior optical characteristics, result in a versatile, environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional paper and backlit LCDs – with nearly endless applications!

For more information about Boogie Board LCD Writing Tablets, go to www.myboogieboard.com

Become a Boogie Board fan on Facebook and follower on Twitter.

For more information about Kent Displays or Improv Electronics, go to www.kentdisplays.com

Kent Displays, Inc. has shareholders in common with IP.com, Inc., so we know and like these folks, and we're happy to help spread the news about this innovative application of its patented technology.

Guy Kawasaki on the Art of Innovation

IP — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 09:24:17 -0500

Entrepreneur, Twitter star, and former Apple software evangelist Guy Kawasaki highlights advice for creating meaning, innovation, and...revenue.

We follow @GuyKawasaki from our Twitter account @ipdotcom and read his blogs, How to Change the World and Holy Kaw!

Guy Kawasaki has thoughtfully included IP.com's blog, Securing Innovation on his Alltop pages for Patents and Innovation (but not on the page of links for Inventions) along with a lot of other blogs we read regularly.

IP.com's Free Global Patent Search Engine

IP — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 12:25:10 -0500

IP.com Inc. has released a new Global Patent Search system for you to test. IP.com's GPS is a free international database of full-text patent and patent-related publications.

IP.com's goal is to encourage worldwide access to resources where innovators can explore and understand patents, technologies, and related art.

In this preliminary version, the database contains the full text of U.S. Patents, U.S. Patent Applications, and IP.com's unique Prior Art Database.

In the coming months IP.com will continue to expand its features and add more patent and non-patent literature to the database. Please check back regularly to see what more we are offering. We think you will be pleasantly surprised.

Check it out.

National Inventor of the Year Nominations

IP — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 11:30:02 -0500

IPO Education Foundation's 37th National Inventor of the Year Award presents an opportunity for you to obtain recognition for a deserving employee, client, or colleague as one of America's most outstanding inventors.

Nominations can be made here on the website of the Intellectual Property Owners Association. The deadline for nominations is March 1st .

The award's purpose is to increase public awareness of current inventors and how they benefit the nation's economy and our quality of life. Recipients of this award in previous years are recognized here.

How to Protect your Intellectual Property

Thomas J. Colson — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 10:04:17 -0500

In a recent discussion on Twitter about defensive publishing, an article I wrote for publication in Machine Design, an online journal by engineers, for engineers, was linked. It's not a new article but, as noted by the IP professionals discussing it on Twitter, the advice is still good. We thought our readers here on IP.com's blog might be interested in seeing it, so we're cross-posting here with a link to the original publication in Machine Design.

Publishing some of your company's innovations can protect the creativity that keeps the company going.

Intellectual property (IP) has long been a mainstay at companies that turn out the newest and the next "best" products. As a result, the race for innovation has become a mad dash to the patent office. New companies need to make their mark early or risk getting left behind. And established companies must maintain and build upon their current IP portfolios to remain contenders in this innovation race. Defensive publishing lets companies ranging from start-ups to major corporations adroitly manage IP without exhausting valuable time and resources.

By definition, defensive publishing is the practice of placing innovation into the public domain. Although the tactic is not new, when used hand in hand with patents and trade secrets, it lets companies efficiently build and maintain competitive IP portfolios.

Traditionally, patents have dominated companies' IP strategies. But patenting is expensive. Companies spend, on average, $12,000 to $15,000 to file one patent application in the U.S. Filing this same application in key locations throughout the world can cost up to five times that figure. Is it wise for any company, no matter how rich, to invest resources and rely on just patents to protect their innovative ideas? This is where defensive publishing steps in.

Defensive publication protects a company's freedom to use its innovation in its products and services. And most defensive publication tactics are easy to implement. For example, if your company develops and patents an innovation vital to its business, and later develops incremental improvements or new uses of that innovation, those later developments are not protected by the initial patents. Patenting every new improvement or new use could be cost prohibitive. But if your company doesn't patent it, a competitor who independently discovers the incremental improvements or new uses might patent them. This could create far more expensive problems for your company in terms of litigation, downstream product redesign, royalty payments, and lost time to market. So how do you protect your freedom to practice without investing huge dollars in patents?

Trade secrets are one option. However, they are not always a realistic way to protect your freedom to practice in today's business and technological environment. In some instances, trade secrets are more dangerous than protective. Employees are hop-ping from company to company more rapidly than ever before. With the advanced searching and data-mining technologies in the market, competitive intelligence has become more effective than ever. Which leads one to ask: Are my trade secrets really secret? Anyone who has been involved in trade-secret litigation knows that specific actions must be taken to turn company secrets into trade secrets. Managers who think they have trade-secret protection, but don't, are at the greatest risk of having their innovations patented by competitors.

Defensive publishing alleviates some of the risks associated with trade secrets. By breaking trade secrets into actual steps and components, companies can safely publish selected pieces of that trade secret. This successfully blocks competitors' patents without disclosing the trade secret itself.

Defensive publishing offers many individually tailored publication tactics. The most obvious one is to use publishing defensively, protecting already established intellectual property portfolios. Two ways to do this are the noncore publication tactic and the conference proceedings publication tactic.

A business-savvy company understands the need for continuous growth and development. However, no company has unlimited financial resources. Though new innovations are a key to many companies' success, not every innovation will be patentable. Because of the costs, companies need to discriminate in choosing what to patent. Only innovations vital to a company's business strategy warrant such a financial investment. But, if a company decides not to patent an innovation, one of its competitors might. Using noncore publication prevents this by placing noncore innovations in the public domain. This protects the creating company's freedom to practice in noncore areas of business while at the same time letting worldwide patent offices search and find this prior art.

Another seemingly obvious defensive tactic is for a company to publish its conference proceedings. When a company attends a conference and gives a presentation, any innovation discussed may be considered prior art, thus providing the basis for rejecting a competitor's patent application. However, unless patent examiners are present at the conference, they may never know of this prior art. By publishing the conference proceedings, a company ensures that the information is available for search by patent examiners.

Contrary to its name, defensive publishing can also be a valuable offensive business strategy. It's not enough to just maintain your IP portfolio. To be a player in today's business world, companies must aggressively build on their portfolios. Publication tactics can help companies combat the competition.

The Pied Piper tactic, a recent approach in IP protection, involves publishing technical details of a pending patent application. Because pending patent applications are kept confidential while in the patent office (for 18 months, with exceptions), a company would use this strategy hoping other companies adopt the technology before the patent's issue. Once the published technology is adopted by a company and built into its products or services, that company becomes the perfect licensing target when the patent is finally issued.

Another offensive tactic is disseminating misinformation to confuse competitors. Typically publications and patents are an excellent source of competitive intelligence. Competitors can use the information to determine the direction and trends of new products and technology. By publishing noncore technology in the mix with core technology, a company can throw off competitors.

The benefits of publishing information on innovations are evident. So how does a company go about publishing its work?

Companies can take the traditional route of working with journals, both paid and academic. Academic journals are an acceptable option but publication is not guaranteed. Even if the work is accepted, the timeliness of publication is up to the editors' discretion. This means that when working with an academic journal, a company has little control over when the material reaches the public domain if, in fact, it ever does.

Another traditional option is to partner with a select group of paper-based journals designed strictly for defensive publishing. Then publication is guaranteed. But even this has its drawbacks. For one, publication is not immediate. There is a delay between the time an innovation is submitted for publication and when it actually reaches print. What's more, the point of publishing an innovation is to provide meaningful access to the patent examiners. Many journals do not offer searchable electronic indices, so busy patent examiners will probably never see them, essentially defeating the publications' purpose.

The latest option for companies is to publish over the Internet, posting information on the corporate Web site. The assumption is doing so puts the information in the public domain. However, this is not necessarily the case. There are a number of legal requirements as to what actually qualifies as a defensive publication. Generally speaking, most sites don't have the proper safeguards in place that can act as critical references downstream in the event of a trial.

Another consideration when posting on the Internet is accessibility to patent examiners. With a workload that has grown by an estimated 75% since 1992, patent examiners don't have time to search thousands of company Web sites. Realistically speaking, innovations posted on individual corporate Web sites will most likely never be found.

The most recent option is a central Web resource designed solely for defensive publishing. The first site to offer such services is IP.com. With security measures in place to assure document retention and authenticity, IP.com lets companies publish innovations via the Internet at low cost and in a small fraction of the time it takes paper-based sources. In addition to publishing services, the site offers a globally accessible database dedicated to defensive publications that is visible to all patent examiners. A complete overview of defensive publishing tactics is available at www.ip.com.

In this age of research and development, it is the intellectual property portfolio that makes or breaks a company's success. A well-rounded IP strategy can be a company's strongest weapon in these times of patent wars. With the help of the Internet, defensive publishing is becoming a highly recognized and respected alternative to more traditional IP management techniques. Using defensive publishing alongside such practices as patenting and trade secrets helps companies enhance and maintain formidable IP portfolios.

You might also want ot check out some of the currently featured articles and editor's picks on Machine Design. Interesting stuff.

Tweet of the Week @Ballard_IP

IP — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 01:39:04 -0500

Dan Ballard of Sequoia Counsel, who's on Twitter @Ballard_IP was quick to pick up on a tweet by @nishantmodak pointing to an oldie but goodie -- an article in Machine Design written by IP.com's CEO, Tom Colson, in 2001 titled "Defensive publishing: Protect your intellectual property".

We don't know what's more surprising, that patent attorneys and others interested in protecting intellectual property were on Twitter on New Year's Day commenting on an article on defensive publishing, or that we were on Twitter on the holiday, too, following their conversations.

It seems that social media doesn't take holidays off.

Have a Very Creative Holiday

IP — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 17:04:23 -0500

Twas the night before Christmas,
when all through the house
not a creature was stirring,
not even a mouse.

Stockings were hung
by the chimney with care,
as the microwaves' thrum
was filling the air.

Creative by AKQA

The Amazing Grace Christmas House. Designed and programmed by Richard Holdman in Pleasant Grove, Utah. You can find out more information about his display at http://www.holdman.com The display has 50,000 lights and is computer controlled by 180 channels.

Tweet of the Week @science_ip

IP — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 21:50:26 -0500

Who knew that on this day in 1903 the Wright brothers made aviation history with the first flight of a powered airplane?

Science IP, a service of CAS and a division of the American Chemical Society on Twitter @science_ip tweeted about this historic achievement today. It's really difficult, a century later, to comprehend how the Wright brothers learned to fly without having anyone to teach them, if you know what we mean.

Coincidentally, Microsoft Corp. and Flight1 Aviation Technologies (Flight1 Tech) announced today that they have entered into an intellectual property (IP) license agreement that gives Flight1 Tech access to Microsoft ESP's powerful visual simulation technology. Flight1 Tech took a license for the Microsoft® ESP(TM) v1.0 object code, which enables the company to create detailed, customized flight safety, flight training and strategic solutions for its customers.

We learned that from an article in Intellectual Property Today, which the magazine tweeted about on Twitter @IPToday. Wonder if they knew the significance of this day in aviation history?

Following these tweets, we learned more about the Wright brothers the invention and patenting of their "Flying Machine" and the ensuing patent war and about the creation of what was probably the first government-enforced patent pool. Interesting history.

Cisco TelePresence Class Act

Thomas J. Colson — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 09:29:43 -0500

On a recent business trip to China to speak at the China Intellectual Property Business Conference, I took the opportunity to meet with the father of our Chinese exchange student who's living with our family in the United States for a year and helping my three girls learn to speak fluently in Mandarin. So this television commercial for Cisco's TelePresence really hit home.

In our business at IP.com we've been using teleconferencing more and more frequently to connect with people in China. Johnson Kong our Executive Vice President, Asia Pacific, is resident there, and I've been traveling on business to China, myself, almost once every month or so, during the past few years. I now speak a bit of Mandarin, with a New York accent. While there's nothing like face-to-face meetings to bridge the cultural divide, it's great to be able to keep in touch on a more regular basis with teleconferencing. Videoconferencing is sure to become a part of our lives, not just our business, sooner than we might have imagined just a few years ago,

Kent Displays: Beauty Skin Deep

IP — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 13:02:32 -0500

Our cell phones and MP3 players will soon have personalized display skins, thanks to innovative technology by Kent Displays in Ohio. These electronic skins allow users to change the color of their electronic device to match an individual's mood or clothing choice without using battery life.

Kent Displays develops and manufactures Reflex™ displays that are sunlight readable, reflective displays that offer a display viewing experience without the typical distracting LCD scan rate and bright backlight. Instead, Reflex displays use ambient light to reflect an image from the display, thus allowing a more comfortable reading experience similar to paper.

Recently, Kent Displays was named a finalist in the NorTech Innovation Awards in the category for Advanced Materials, with the winners to be announced in an upcoming issue of Crain's Cleveland Business.

The NorTech Innovation Awards define innovation as transformation of technical and scientific knowledge into novel products, services and processes which result in a positive economic impact to the organization, the community, the country along with our regional and global technology economies. Innovation embodies the union of creativity, expressed in the discovery of new scientific and technological knowledge, with commercialization, which includes all of the efforts necessary to successfully bring the novel product, service or process to the marketplace to achieve economic impact.

But beauty is more than skin deep at Kent Displays, whose patented technology was licensed by Fujitsu for its new color e-book reader Flepia that is available now in Japan.

Founded in 1993 as the result of a joint venture between Kent State University and Manning Ventures (also a shareholder of IP.com Inc.), Kent Displays, Inc. is a world leader in the research, development, and manufacture of Reflex™ liquid crystal displays for unique, sustainable applications. Its revolutionary Reflex LCDs retain an image without power and offer superior optical characteristics including sunlight-readability and wide viewing angles. In October 2008, Kent Displays installed a new roll-to-roll production line at corporate headquarters in Kent, Ohio, to mass produce Reflex LCDs from rolls of plastic. The line is the first of its kind in the world and produces no waste water/chemicals and less solvent emissions than sheet-based processes. The flexibility, durability and exceptional thinness of the resulting plastic displays, combined with no power image retention and superior optical characteristics, result in a versatile, environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional paper and backlit LCDs – with nearly endless applications. The company is committed to sustainability through technology innovation.

LED Tattoos? Implanted Silicon Electronics

IP — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 13:45:22 -0500

Researchers have been able to build thin, flexible silicon electronics on silk substrates that almost completely dissolve inside the body. Does this mean we might be looking at LED tattoos in the future?

A recent article in Technology Review, published by MIT, brings to mind this Philips Design Probe from a couple of years ago, where the human body is explored as a platform for electronics and interactive skin technology.

By building thin, flexible silicon electronics on silk substrates, researchers have made electronics that almost completely dissolve inside the body. So far the research group has demonstrated arrays of transistors made on thin films of silk. While electronics must usually be encased to protect them from the body, these electronics don't need protection, and the silk means the electronics conform to biological tissue. The silk melts away over time and the thin silicon circuits left behind don't cause irritation because they are just nanometers thick.

Cool.

Tweet of the Week @jmattbuchanan

IP — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 15:06:49 -0500

Interesting observation by patent attorney J. Matthew Buchanan that, until he mentioned it, Google found no results for "shortest patent claims", in quotes. We expect that may not be so true in the near future. Buchanan Intellectual Property Office is online at bipo and we're following Matt on Twitter @jmattbuchanan where he's also holding in trust the username @uspto for the United States Patent and Trademark Office. If you're into patents and looking ahead of the curve, you'll find Matt Buchanan.

Which are your favorite law blogs?

IP — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 23:10:45 -0500

"Having a short attention span, my personal favorites change weekly, if not daily, depending on my immediate mood and interests," says Stephen Albainy-Jenei.

ABA Journal Blawg 100 Law Blogs

IP — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 06:29:20 -0500

Congratulations to Dennis Crouch at Patently-O and Gene Quinn at IP Watchdog who were recognized in the third annual ABA Journal Blawg 100, the best legal blogs as selected by the Journal’s editors with a little help from their readers.

You're invited to go here and vote for your favorites.

In addition, these Intellectual Property law bloggers should garner a good number of "write in" votes:

Jeremy Phillips at IPKat
Ron Coleman at Likelihood of Confusion
Dave Donoghue at the Chicago IP Litigation Blog
Duncan Bucknell at IP Think Tank
Stephen Albainy-Jenei at Patent Baristas

They're all winners as far as we're concerned.

We're Thankful for Jeremy Phillips & IPKat

IP — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 08:57:23 -0500

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

So, it's come to this has it? We're now posting pictures of cats with funny captions in an attempt to meet the standards set by Jeremy Phillips for what makes an Intellectual Property blog remarkable these days. Not sure this will help us.

We can't compete with The IPKat on substance, and we're not sure we'll be able to match his inimitable style. But we're trying. Our featured Guest Blogger is non other than Jeremy Phillips himself. Now, if we can just keep up.

As we pushed ourselves away from the Thanksgiving dinner table and got thinking about what to write about the press release we received yesterday from the Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property Policy (SABIP) in the UK, we noticed that Jeremy Phillips had a front row seat at the press conference and has already written extensively, and with authority, here and here at The IPKat blog.

In short, SABIP's chairman Joly Dixon, summarised the plot. We Brits are now going to deepen our knowledge of how IP works within the economy and make up for the fact that we have little hard evidence as to precisely how IP affects its owners, users and the various markets in which it is engaged or exploited.

Here in the former colonies, we aren't surprised that The IPKat scooped us again on the important story of the day, as he so often does. Actually, we're thankful.

Have a great weekend.

India's Traditional Knowledge Digital Library

IP — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 01:42:26 -0500

The misappropriation of traditional knowledge through the mistaken issuance of patents has been a growing concern with the rise of the global economy and the increasing importance of intellectual property. A few high profile cases brought significant attention to this matter, prompting efforts by a number of countries to create digital traditional knowledge databases accessible to patent examiners around the world.

Recently, the Commerce Department’s United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) announced in this press release that the Government of India has granted the agency’s patent examiners access to a new digital database containing a compilation of traditional Indian knowledge. Access to the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) is important for both India and the United States to prevent misappropriation of traditional knowledge.

The new database, developed jointly by India’s Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) and the Department of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy (AYUSH), includes over 200,000 traditional medicine formulations on Ayurveda, Unani and Siddha comprising 30 million pages. The TKDL contains text-searchable English-language translations of these sources, permitting USPTO examiners to search thousands of years of India’s accumulated traditional knowledge. The TKDL also contains translations into French, German, Japanese and Spanish, from these sources, originally written in Hindi, Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian and Urdu.

This database will be an important addition to the growing array of search tools on traditional knowledge from around the world that is already available to USPTO examiners. These tools include dictionaries, formularies, handbooks, and historical or classical works, as well as databases such as the TKDL. USPTO examiners use these tools to help prevent the patenting, and thereby misappropriation, of existing traditional knowledge.

Sound Engineering Leads Music Innovation

IP — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:58:43 -0500

The Rocketboom Institute for Internet Studies examines the phenomenon of Auto-Tune with help from special guest Professor "Weird Al" Yankovic!

China Intellectual Property Business

Thomas J. Colson — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 15:48:08 -0500

I've been looking forward to this week's trip to Asia, where I'll be getting together with other speakers at the first IP transaction focused conference in China. Marshall Phelps, Corporate VP for IP Policy and Strategy at Microsoft, Joff Wild, Editor of IAM Magazine, and Duncan Bucknell, CEO, IP Strategist, Lawyer & Patent Attorney, coincidentally our featured guest blogger here on IP.com's corporate blog, Securing Innovation, are among the global IP leaders speaking at this conference.

China Intellectual Property Business 2009 ("CIPB 2009") is organized by Global Leaders Institute, which issued a press release today announcing the conference. It will take place on November 18-19, 2009 at the Shanghai Marriott Hotel Hongqiao.

This conference is mainly focused on Intellectual Property transaction issues, including IP strategies, IP portfolio management, diversified IP transaction methods, IP valuation approaches and database applications.

Unlike other IP conferences focused on legal issues, this event deals more with the strategic concerns within a company rather than just protection issues. Not only are IP counsels and patent counsels being invited to this event, corporate CEOs, Vice Presidents and General Counsels are all expected to join this exciting conference.

Director of SIPA, Mr. Guoqiang Lv, will make the opening address for this event and deliver a presentation as the curtain raiser for CIPB 2009. Former Supreme Court Judge, Mr. Jiang Zhipei will also deliver a speech on the current IP business background, especially in China.

120 companies from different industries will join this event. Among them, this conference has gathered over 30 Global IP Leaders and IP Strategists to brainstorm the IP strategies and transaction issues in this booming China market, including, Philips IP&S, Microsoft, Nokia, SAP, Bosch, Sanofi-Aventis, Agilent Technologies, Alibaba, Alcatel Lucent Shanghai Bell, and TSMC. Leading Chinese firms will also present on site, including ZTE, BYD and TCL.

Thomson Reuters, IP.com, TechInsights, Finnegan, Property Corp. and RPX Corporation have engaged this event as its honored sponsors. Mr. David Liu, the Managing Director of China from Thomson Reuters will make a toast during the first day's lunch.

This conference is problem solution driven and each company who has the need to extract more value from their IP assets will find a suitable solution for them and find potential business partners either during the conference or after the conference. Hope to see you there.

You can log on the event website for more information: http://www.cipbusiness.com

If you're attending CIPB 2009, as well, or would like to get together while I'm in China, please contact me by email tcolson [at] ip.com either in advance or during the conference, and we'll set something up.