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Comment by gridspy | Hacker News Reader

The biggest concern to me - given two competitors, the one who delays their product to market while they get patents wins. I want a patent system that I can safely ignore without someone else later 'inventing' the same thing as me and taking me to court.

"[T]he bill would put the United States under the same first-inventor-to-file system for patent applications used by Europe and Japan. Currently the country operates on a first-to-invent system" ...

"John Conyers [...] said it would permit the Patent and Trademark Office to award a patent to the first person who can win a race to the patent office regardless of who is the actual inventor."

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I would hope prior work would be an acceptable defense in court against a first-to-file-patent suit.

e.g. you really don't care about patents. Guy later patents what you're doing and sues you. You prove prior work, suit fails.

Best of both worlds?

You have to publish your work to make yourself protected.

Undisclosed prior art is not a defense in first to fiel systems

Well, you can file an invention disclosure with the PTO. I'm not sure, but I would think this would be sufficient to establish prior art.

An invention disclosure is just the actual description of the invention that an inventor writes used by a lawyer to write a patent. Its the actual description of the invention before its translated into patent speak.

The difference between one of these and a patent is best summed up by one of my favorite Terry Pratchett quotes: "It's the difference between using a feather and using a chicken."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_disclosure

There is a prior user defense, see 35 USC 273. Unfortunately, in its current form it is essentially useless, as it only applies to method claims, and nearly all patents contain both product and method claims.

However, the House version of the reform bill expands the defense to cover all types of claims; thus if it survives reconciliation with the Senate bill it will likely become a viable defense.

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