The USPTO really will patent absolutely anything

[Topher925]

A method for inducing cats to exercise consists of directing a beam of invisible light produced by a hand-held laser apparatus onto the floor or wall or other opaque surface in the vicinity of the cat, then moving the laser so as to cause the bright pattern of light to move in an irregular way...

http://media.fukung.net/images/13471/5c63f4db815ec14d850c49ef1d5d10a1.jpg

http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPAT5443036
US Patent Number: 5,443,036

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

I think that there are a lot of patents like this. I'm trying to think of the word for it and all I am coming up with is 'reapplication'. Even though a device is already patented one can submit a new patent using more or less the same device just claiming a different application. In this way someone can produce and sell an item that already exists without needed to get permission from the original patent holder or having to pay them anything for the use of their designs.

 

[junglebeast]

I think that there are a lot of patents like this. I'm trying to think of the word for it and all I am coming up with is 'reapplication'. Even though a device is already patented one can submit a new patent using more or less the same device just claiming a different application. In this way someone can produce and sell an item that already exists without needed to get permission from the original patent holder or having to pay them anything for the use of their designs.

dude, it's like you didn't notice that this is a patent for any moving pattern of light used to distract an animal! that's like patenting your "sexy walk" that gets all the ladies and trying to charge people money when you see them imitating your "sexy walk"!

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

I will show this to my sister. She is a patent lawyer and may have something interesting to say about this

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

dude, it's like you didn't notice that this is a patent for any moving pattern of light used to distract an animal! that's like patenting your "sexy walk" that gets all the ladies and trying to charge people money when you see them imitating your "sexy walk"!

Oh! hahaha... I thought it was for a laser pointer and the diagram was just to demonstrate its application. lol

Still, one can patent an exersize regimen or diet plan. This isn't really that different. We just tend to think things are more silly when they are for pets (and they probably are).

Do you think that this would be a silly thing to patent?

Now actually protecting/enforcing the patent could be problematic but that isn't so much the patent office's concern I don't think.

Mind you that the patent protection only applies to those that are attempting to use your patented idea for profit. So just some old lady playing with her cat in the park that happens to copy this persons patent isn't going to be held at all liable. Anyone who say attempts to reproduce this in book on cat exercise though could definitely be held liable. There are also certain gray areas like say a veterinarian teaching a client to exercise their cat in this way.

 

[pantaz]

Plenty more here... http://totallyabsurd.com/archive.htm

 

[Moonbear]

I will show this to my sister. She is a patent lawyer and may have something interesting to say about this

If she's any good at it, spare her the pain. I've stopped sharing things like this with my boyfriend, because he just goes into a rant about the morons who are employed as patent examiners. Alternatively, it sometimes turns into a rant about the hacks who will take people's money and hand them an unenforceable patent.

Apparently, when something like this gets patented, it's because the claims are so limited and narrowly defined that they are unenforceable and nothing else will ever even be at risk of infringing on them.

Basically, all this might ever stop someone from doing is putting an insert into a laser pointer package describing a specific method of aiming the light to get your cat to exercise. Not covered by the patent...the actual light source, the hand holding it, any other "regular" pattern of moving the light, the cat, use of the pattern for any other purpose than "exercising" the cat, such as for interacting and playing with the cat, teasing the cat, irritating the dog by making the cat run around, etc.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

If she's any good at it, spare her the pain.

Here is what she quickly said :)

Good luck enforcing that. That also issued in the good ol 90s. Because of the good ol' 90s now they won't allow ANYTHING.

 

[mgb_phys]

The USPTO takes the view of approving pretty much everything - it's then upto the court to decide if it stands. Since uniquely the US allows first to invent rather than first to patent, almost every case ends up in court since irrespective of the patent you still have to demonstrate that you invented it first.

They also allow a lot of 'with an X' or 'on an X' style patents, so you can take a bunch of existing stuff and patent doing exactly the same thing with a laser/computer or doing it on a mobile phone.
There have even been patents recently to IBM for the business idea of creating a lot of patents to use as weapons against a competitor.

 

[Alfi]

My cats love that form of exercise.

I hope I don't owe anyone anything. I've been doing it for years.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

My cats love that form of exercise.

I hope I don't owe anyone anything. I've been doing it for years.

Did you sell it?

The only thing that I can see here is the possibility that someone will try to make and market an automatic exercise system for cats that uses a LASER. In that case the patent might be enforceable.

 

[Sorry!]

I always thought patents were to prevent people from stealing and SELLING other peoples ideas. In this case if you had a laser pointer and were playing with your cat you wouldn't be breaking any laws... However if you tried to sell it as a cats aerobic toy you would be. Same goes with the walk. If you sold lessons on how to do the walk and someone else tried selling lessons on how to do the same walk then they are breaking the law (assuming its patented) or if the person somehow made money from walking that way... I don't think they patent walking styles though...

 

[mgb_phys]

It depends on the country - in the UK and most places that uses the original definition of patent you can make the invention for your own use but are prohibited from selling it (or sometimes for import/exporting it).
Mr Carnegie used this loophole to use the Bessemer process for making steel for free - the US argued that he wasn't selling Bessemer converters so he wasn't breaking the patent.
Later when the US became a major manufacturer (and invented it's own industrial processes) the rules changed and the US now has the widest definition of a patent - it allows ideas, business methods, utilisations, software algorithms and even story plotlines to be patented. The only thing specificaly prohibited by the USPTO is 'philosophical ideas'

 

[Alfi]

Did you sell it?

The only thing that I can see here is the possibility that someone will try to make and market an automatic exercise system for cats that uses a LASER. In that case the patent might be enforceable.

Is 'sell it' the criteria?
Am I allowed to just look through a bunch of patent ideas and just build 'for me' the ones I find useful?
Sure saves ME a bunch of R&D for some ideas.

I 'gifted' a few laser pointers to my friends and family for them to use as cat toys.

I guess my point is that I don't see this idea as a patentable item.

 

[mgb_phys]

Is 'sell it' the criteria?
Am I allowed to just look through a bunch of patent ideas and just build 'for me' the ones I find useful?
Sure saves ME a bunch of R&D for some ideas.

Depends on the country - but generally yes.
Saving R+D is the idea - in return for a few years of monopoly the inventor gifts the idea for the good of humanity.

The best hope to overthrow this is to show some prior-art, that the idea existed before the patent was filed. The USPTO is (in)famous for limiting it's prior art searches to pretty much its own patents.

The difficulty with US patents is that the holder can pick the location of the court to try the case - if they can show that they have a single user in that jurisdiction. East Texas is notorious for agreeing with the patent holder so most corporations keep an office in the area to file patent cases.

 

[Moonbear]

Did you sell it?

The only thing that I can see here is the possibility that someone will try to make and market an automatic exercise system for cats that uses a LASER. In that case the patent might be enforceable.

Probably not, because it only talks about a hand-held laser. I wonder if the patent is owned by the company that sells the cheap laser pointers in the pet store labeled as a cat toy instead of labeled as a laser pointer?

 

[berkeman]

BTW, the drawing in the OP appears to be fake. It isn't the drawing page from the patent. Probably a spoof on the whole concept of the patent, but not from the patent itself. The drawings in the patent do not even show the traditional laser pointer -- instead it's some strange little laser gun-looking thing...

 

[Moonbear]

It's more mind-boggling that somebody wasted their money on the filing fees for something so useless. Though, it seems an interesting commentary on the whole field of patents...that usually seems like a cat and mouse game too. Someone makes some claims, someone else makes something and finds a way to just eek by and not infringe on those claims by the slightest technicality, someone else can't find a way around both sets of claims, so tries to sue to invalidate one or both prior patents, someone else failed to pay attention and did infringe on the claims of one or all three, and gets sued and pays for the patents of all three (those are the big, scary litigation cases, when some of the big guns actually join forces and go after the little guy, obliterating him in one fell swoop).

 

[Mororvia]

Its not so much the USPTO allowing a patent on anything, its "inventors" willing to go through the hassle to get a patent on anything. If the new claims don't read on any previous work and are within the scope of the laws, its patentable! The saying among examiners is "stupid is patentable"

 

[berkeman]

Things must change over time, as mentioned previously in the thread. Back in 1987 when HP filed my first patent application, it was like pulling teeth to get the patent examiner to see that we had made a fundamental improvement over existing graphics tablets.

http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/4806918/description.html

I swear, the improvements should have been obvious from reading our application and studying the prior art, but in the end I had to work out the math for him to show how much of an improvement it was. Jeeze.

But it sounds like by the mid-90's the trend was the opposite way, and may have swung back to more conservative again now. You'd think it would be more scientific than it is...

 

[mgb_phys]

Its not so much the USPTO allowing a patent on anything, its "inventors" willing to go through the hassle to get a patent on anything.

When you file a patent (at least a WIPO - not sure about the USPTO) you sign a declaration that you don't know of any prior-art. In theory it is perjury to make a false statement.
It also increases the damages if you can be shown to have known about a previous invention. Because of this some companies don't allow engineers to look at any patents - although this could be regarded as willful negligence in court.

If the new claims don't read on any previous work and are within the scope of the laws, its patentable! The saying among examiners is "stupid is patentable"

The USPTO does seem to only check it's own patents for prior art. It claims to only limit prior art searches to patent claims for foreign patents but it doesn't seem to look too widely for other patents.
There was a famous case where a patent was granted to a US university for using Turmeric as anti sceptic on wounds ( just turmeric - not a drug derived form a chemical in it) - apparently the writers of the ancient hindu vedas had neglected to file them with the USPTO.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

Is 'sell it' the criteria?
Am I allowed to just look through a bunch of patent ideas and just build 'for me' the ones I find useful?
Sure saves ME a bunch of R&D for some ideas.

I 'gifted' a few laser pointers to my friends and family for them to use as cat toys.

I guess my point is that I don't see this idea as a patentable item.

Generally it is a matter of whether or not you make money off of the idea. So if you build yourself some sort of manufacturing device that is already patented and use it to produce product for your business you can be held liable for infringement I believe.

 

[NeoDevin]

A patent like the one in the OP would be filed to help prevent competition. Most likely, a laser pointer manufacturer decided they would market a line of pointers for pet play, and patented (individually) every possible pet play "variation" (entertainment, exercise, interaction, etc) so that hopefully no one else would be able to market anything to that particular demographic. It's not a patent on a laser pointer, it's a patent on an application of a laser pointer. If another company were to try to market a laser pointer as a "pet exerciser" they would be infringing.

It may seem silly to patent such an application, but the company spends a couple thousand dollars patenting every related application they can think of, and as a result it helps prevent competition in that particular niche market.