Re: The patent process [Was Re: Sharing the Family PC is Patent-Pending]

[Barry Margolin]

In article <Xns94E6E793BEE71elektrosmdonet@130.133.1.4>,
 Alun <elektros@yahoo.com> wrote:

> It's hard to be precise, but much harder to do it plain language, and I say 
> that from experience. And, no it's not technical precision that's required. 
> The claims define the monopoly, and that's a legal matter, not a technical 
> one.

But shouldn't this be defined in terms of the technical features, and 
hence use language that would be meaningful to technical professionals?

> The abstract is the place to give a good technical summary, but there 
> isn't much downside to writing a bad one, plus you can use the same one for 
> a number of related inventions.

We've always been told that the abstract doesn't matter.

If a technical person is going to make any use of patents, shouldn't 
they be able to understand them?  If the understandable part is the 
abstract, but it doesn't really say the same thing as the claims, they 
could be led down the garden path, thinking that they're not infringing.

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar@alum.mit.edu
Arlington, MA
*** PLEASE post questions in newsgroups, not directly to me ***