[Infowarrior] - Internet Review for Patents Draws Near

[Richard Forno]

Internet Review for Patents Draws Near
Alan Sipress
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/posttech/

With the agency responsible for issuing patents now planning to throw open
its review process to the Internet, the latest word is that this wiki-type
experiment is expected to start around June 1.

New York Law School Professor Beth Simone Noveck, who heads a team designing
the pilot project, outlined the schedule for a lunchtime seminar today on
Capitol Hill. She also previewed the Web site that members of the public can
use to submit information they believe is relevant to evaluating whether
inventions deserve a patent or not. The site itself will enter beta testing
in early April, she said.

The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a Washington think
tank that hosted the session, said Noveck's screenshots would be posted
shortly on its own Web site.

Under the pilot project, individuals and companies requesting patents can
volunteer to have the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office post their
applications on the Internet for public input. Anyone who may have technical
material related to the application, for instance journal articles, prior
patents and software code, can upload these on to the site along with an
explanation about why this information is relevant. Participants will vote
on a top-ten list of submissions to forward to the patent office examiners,
who can then use the material in evaluating the applications.

The project will start with 250 applications for software patents. Noveck
and her team have already lined up some of the country's most prominent tech
companies, including Microsoft and IBM, to volunteer their applications.
But, she added, the initiative also includes an incentive that could make it
appealing to small entrepreneurs: a guarantee that their applications will
jump to the front of the queue for consideration. Now, the average waiting
time for a software or computer-related patent is four years.

The U.S. patent office is not alone in opening its long secretive
deliberations to the Internet. Just back from London, Noveck said the United
Kingdom's patent office is moving ahead with a similar "peer-to-patent"
review process.