affinity labs
affinity labs of texas, llc v. urltoken inc. | finnegan | leading intellectual property (ip) law firm
affinity labs of texas, llc v. directv, llc | finnegan | leading intellectual property (ip) law firm
three binding affinity patterns were found in brains from subjects without neurologic disease in similar proportions to those reported previously from studies of ms brains. tspo ligands showed substantial differences in affinity between subjects classified as high - affinity binders (habs) and low - affinity binders (labs). differences in affinity between habs and labs are approximately 50 - fold with pbr28, approximately 17 - fold with pbr06, and approximately 4 - fold with daa1106, dpa713, and pbr111. where differences in affinity between habs and labs were low (∼4 - fold), distinct affinities were not resolvable in binding curves for mixed - affinity binders (mabs), which appeared to express 1 class of sites with an affinity approximately equal to the mean of those for habs and labs. mixed - affinity binding was detected in platelets from an independent sample (hab, 69% ; mab, 31 %), although labs were not detected. analysis of 11c - pbr28 pet data was not inconsistent with the existence of distinct subpopulations of habs, mabs, and labs .
below, bluefin labs' full lists of the top 10 shows by brand and audience segments .
in fact, we’ve heard that this was not a coincidence but rather a repeat performance of sorts that has been planned all along. affinity labs was reportedly started in 2006 as a way for michel to replicate and enhance his success with urltoken by selling a handful of similar sites to monster within a relatively short period of time (an exit of one to two years). monster even planned to invest in affinity labs before ceo andrew j. mckelvey stepped down from his post during the company’s options backdating scandal in late 2006. once mckelvey was gone, monster shied away from investing and affinity labs raised its series a with mayfield instead. however, affinity labs continued to collaborate with the urltoken team within monster to develop its handful of portals .
job listings site monster announced today that it has paid $ 61m for a young startup called affinity labs, which runs a set of websites for niche audiences such as police officers and nurses .
mixed - affinity binding in humans with 18 - kda translocator protein ligands. - pubmed - ncbi
sal iannuzzi, monster’s chairman and chief executive officer, said, “we believe affinity’s model complements the core monster business and significantly enhances our presence in key verticals within the online vocational and networking market. our investment in affinity provides monster with an efficient vehicle for developing future revenue streams in vibrant career fields while permitting us to actively invest in product, technology and brand support in our core business. the addition of affinity labs to the monster family will benefit both job seekers and customers in the vertical markets where affinity operates. ”
affinity uses a technology platform that allows for rapid development cycles and scalability in servicing multiple high growth career fields. currently, affinity operates 7 professional and career oriented networks that include law enforcement, healthcare, education, government and technology. the combination of monster and affinity labs will enhance monster’s service offering to job seekers by providing highly relevant content through career guides, industry job searches, trade news and social networking. employers will also benefit by having efficient access to a targeted pool of job candidates in desirable career fields. monster and affinity were parties to an agreement, signed early in 2007, that leveraged monster’s advertising sales force and allowed job seekers access to affinity’s portfolio of sites when registering for a mymonster account .
well, affinity photo from serif labs is here to address the naysayers among us. first of all, it’s available at a one - time price, and a very inviting one at that: for $ 49. 99, you get not only the software, but also all future updates and releases. affinity photo is available from the mac app store —currently (and likely for the foreseeable future) mac os x only, 10. 7 or later, 64 - bit processor—courtesy of serif labs .
monster, the giant job listing company, has acquired silicon valley’s affinity labs, a company that runs several online community sites — including for police officer, healthcare employees, teachers, government employees and technologists. the purchase price was about $ 61 million .
monster has acquired affinity labs inc. , a development stage company that operates a portfolio of professional and vocational communities for people entering, advancing and networking in certain dedicated occupations. affinity’s network of vertical community sites will provide monster’s overall user and job seeker base relevant content and community features while enabling the company to increase its online advertising services to a larger, targeted customer base .
affinity labs of texas, llc, lost two cases at the federal circuit last week, both in decisions authored by judge bryson, which chief judge prost and judge wallach joining the opinions. although the patents at issue in the two cases were different, they shared a similar specification. see affinity labs of tex. v. directv llc, no. 2015 - 1845, 2015 - 1846, 2015 - 1847, 2015 - 1848, 2016 u. s. app. lexis 17371 (fed. cir. sep. 23, 2016); and affinity labs of tex. v. amazon. com, inc. , no. 2015 - 2080, 2016 u. s. app. lexis 17370 (fed. cir. sep. 23, 2016) .
i will readily admit that the longer i work with affinity photo, the greater my affinity towards it. i may not be a convert just yet, but, as the application sees further movement in the direction i’d like it to go, i may move with it. so for now, take the plunge and you too will go to affinity and beyond .
affinity labs is led by christopher michel, the founder of military. com, which was acquired by monster in 2004 and has become the leading vertical portal for military personnel and their families. mr. michel will join the monster executive team and report directly to mr. iannuzzi .
the hallmarks of rilas’ services are pragmatism, simplicity and contribution. with deep expertise, rilas helps discovery labs improve productivity, utilization, costs and breakthroughs .
a passion for developing efficient processes to improve the productivity of early discovery labs led laszlo varady, ph. d. , to found rilas technologies in 2009 .
mm, a method for conducting business using utterly conventional technology. how affinity could have thought they could prevail with such claims is a wonder .
since that time, laszlo has worked with almost all commercially available forms of hplc / uplc and purification systems, developing unique processes that create powerful results within medicinal chemistry labs .
in a statement, kate sirkin, evp of global research director at starcom mediavest group—which recently announced it was partnering with bluefin labs to help inform its clients media buys—noted that “understanding the cause - and - effect relationship between paid and earned media is a challenge. bluefin labs’ data provides us with an incredibly valuable new data set to evaluate this relationship. ”
based in dripping springs, texas, affinity labs is an innovation consulting firm and a leading advisor on idea - to - launch strategies for clients of all sizes. we work with our clients to identify their highest - value opportunities, to address their challenges, and to help them transition through the innovation drivetrain from idea to launch .
affinity sued nine defendants. the defendants moved to dismiss the complaints for failure to state a claim, arguing that the asserted claims were not directed to patentable subject matter .
to filter social tv data by brand segment, thai said bluefin labs first looked at all the people in the social media universe who commented (positively or negatively) on a particular brand. then they dug deeper to identify the tv shows these particular social media users most frequently talked about. to rank the shows, bluefin labs created a “show index, ” which is normalized on an index of 100 .
11c - pbr28 pet can detect the 18 - kda translocator protein (tspo) expressed within macrophages. however, quantitative evaluation of the signal in brain tissue from donors with multiple sclerosis (ms) shows that pbr28 binds the tspo with high affinity (binding affinity [ ki ], ∼4 nm), low affinity (ki, ∼200 nm), or mixed affinity (2 sites with ki, ∼4 nm and ∼300 nm). our study tested whether similar binding behavior could be detected in brain tissue from donors with no history of neurologic disease, with tspo - binding pet ligands other than 11c - pbr28, for tspo present in peripheral blood, and with human brain pet data acquired in vivo with 11c - pbr28 .
“to affinity and beyond” is, no doubt, the secret (or maybe not so secret) rallying cry behind this photo editing software. for affinity photo to go beyond its current constraints, however, there are numerous glitches that need to be fixed and features that must be ironed out or added, not least of which is ensuring full and unfettered third - party plug - in support .
laszlo was the first to publish affinity chromatography on sub 2 micron particles. laszlo also developed a hydrophilic coating technology for polystyrene resulting in a wide range of high - performance stationary phases for protein purifications .
update: this piece was not intended to suggest that there was any improper relationship between michel and monster that would lead to an inappropriately high purchase price. michel’s previous sale to monster, military. com, is currently valued at hundreds of millions of dollars; therefore, it’s conceivable that one or more of affinity lab’s information portals could become just as successful and justify the $ 61m sales tag. this deal was also vetted by goldman sachs, which should allay concerns of impropriety due to monster’s previous relationship with michel. my skepticism over whether monster paid too much stems from my cursory assessment of affinity lab’s properties, not a detailed look at the company’s revenues or even michel’s standing relationship with monster. i’ve been told that the architecture behind affinity labs’ sites is actually quite sophisticated, as it allows for the quick deployment of new properties .
and the visitors to affinity’s sites have focused interests, making them attractive to advertisers. they’re easier to target. because the sites are aligned according to industry vocation, it makes them especially attractive to a company like monster, which specializes in job listings. strategically, this acquisition makes a lot of sense, and the overall price, while high for affinity’s current traffic, isn’t that much considering monster’s size .
bluefin labs also sliced the data by broader audience segments, comparing beer and wine drinkers, and cat and dog owners. the company identified the lifestyle groups by analyzing historical social media chatter and then ranked the shows each group talked about most .
with the exception of 11c - pk11195, all tspo pet ligands in current clinical application recognize habs, labs, and mabs in brain tissue in vitro. knowledge of subjects' binding patterns will be required to accurately quantify tspo expression in vivo using pet .
this is an eyebrow raising price, because most of affinity’s sites are just a few months old, and we’re told they have less than 500, 000 visitors a month combined. in other words, the price translates into $ 122 a visitor, which is relatively high. [ update: affinity tells it gets 800, 000 visitors a month, which translates into a more reasonable $ 76 a visitor ] it’s a big win for affinity, which received a $ 6 million round of capital a year ago from silicon valley venture firms mayfield and trinity (yes, at the time, we cited a source that said $ 10 million, but the company took only $ 6 million) .
tom thai, vp of marketing and business development at bluefin labs, said that over the past year his company has been sharing the “basic building blocks” of social tv analytics with television networks and agencies, but that the next step was to make the information brand specific .
it would also help if serif labs, the company behind affinity photo, added context - sensitive pop - up wizards to explain the various functions, especially the more esoteric settings and monikers. to make matters worse, the online help is woefully inadequate and there’s no downloadable instructional pdf, although online tutorials do help to some degree. what is especially promising and inviting, however, is the willingness of the developers to listen to and act on suggestions and critique, especially when it comes to fixing bugs .
there is support for third - party plug - ins, but don’t smile just yet. this aspect of the program is buggy to the hilt. one plug - in crashed affinity photo; others failed to launch. (i’m told they’re working on improving this feature. )
the announcement highlights the fact you don’t need to build a revolutionary product if you have a well - defined buyer in mind from the start (and it doesn’t hurt have a little bit of history with that buyer as well). affinity labs didn’t build anything worth mention in the tech press, but it quickly executed on a project that it knew would be attractive for monster given that company’s need for reaching professionals in demand. the deal also highlights the weaknesses and needs of a company like monster, which has a harder time developing internally and will therefore gladly pay for several small startups rather than trying to deploy online destinations itself .
not surprisingly, sports programming features prominently on the top 10 list for beer drinkers, while fashion and relationship - related programming dominates the list for wine drinkers. the lists for cat and dog owners are also fairly intuitive, although bluefin labs found that while animal planet shows ranked highly on both lists, tlc was actually the top network for both groups .
affinity’s patent - in - suit was directed to a method for targeted advertising, in which “an advertisement is selected for delivery to the user of a portable device based on at least one piece of demographic information about the user. ” the court noted that only the abstract, three sentences in the specification, and one of the 20 claims, actually dealt with targeted advertising. affinity accused the amazon music system of patent infringement because the system allows customers to stream music from a customized library. the amazon entities moved for entry of judgment on the pleadings, arguing that the asserted patent claims were not directed to patentable subject matter .
to date, social tv data like that from bluefin labs, as well as social tv analytics and check - in companies like trendrr, radian6, getglue, socialguide and miso, has mostly focused on general audience responses to tv shows and networks. but in the coming year, thai said, bluefin plans to dig deeper to generate more data about conversations related to brands .
[ update: i just talked with michel, and he confirms that he’s going to be working closely with monster to help bring it more visibility in silicon valley, working with other companies with community - oriented sites to see if a relationship with monster makes sense. update ii: he adds that a million members have registered at affinity’s sites. ]
in the directv decision, the federal circuit followed the alice / mayo framework and found the claims patent ineligible. perhaps of note, the court rebuffed affinity’s arguments regarding novelty, explaining patent eligibility does not turn on novelty of the claims. in the amazon decision the federal circuit ruled that basic user customization is insufficient to qualify as inventive under mayo and alice .
in a september 23, 2016, decision relating to the subject matter eligibility of patents under 35 u. s. c. § 101, the federal circuit affirmed the district court’s order dismissing the case. the court concluded that affinity’s patent - in - suit, directed to streaming regional broadcast signals to cellular telephones located outside of the broadcaster’s region, was drawn to an abstract idea .
if the claim does include such subject matter, such as a law of nature, math, business method, etc. , step 2 becomes important. but, except for enfish, the courts seem to simply say that x subject matter is patent ineligible subject matter without really explaining why, except by analogy to prior cases. they have now given us, in these affinity cases, the following :
the affinity of tspo ligands was measured in the human brain postmortem from donors with a history of ms (n = 13), donors without any history of neurologic disease (n = 20), and in platelets from healthy volunteers (n = 13). binding potential estimates from thirty - five 11c - pbr28 pet scans from an independent sample of healthy volunteers were analyzed using a gaussian mixture model .
additionally, the court addressed affinity’s assertions that the use of a downloadable application for presenting a graphical interface on a cellular phone capable of listing contents for streaming was novel as of the priority date of the invention. the court explained that patent eligibility does not turn on the novelty of the proposed claims. the court upheld the district court’s dismissal of the complaint, stating the patent - in - suit was not patent eligible .
still, for its price alone, this is one image - editing app worth owning. but more than that, affinity photo is worth using for its plethora of features, even if the application is not as intuitive as some might like us to believe. more to the point, with this application, countless photo enthusiasts and aspiring pros can now afford to learn and master complex digital photo retouching and compositing without compromise .
affinity photo sought to make itself distinct from photoshop and the photoshop - wannabe’s out there with a unique language and working methodology. i may not agree with it all, such as the use of “persona” in place of module or workspace, but you may find these touches endearing. if you’re new to photo editing, you’ll see nothing wrong with them, of course. with that said, we’ll be focusing on the two modules that do most of the work, outlining important features and offering targeted critique and suggestions for use .
on the other hand, monster has a tight relationship with affinity’s chief executive, christopher michel (pictured top), who served monster well earlier: he co - founded urltoken, and sold it to monster in 2004, and it has since become a leading portal for military personnel and their families. monster bought that company for $ 40 million when the internet market was still depressed after the bubble burst. but urltoken has since grown to more than 7 million uniques a month, and is probably worth on the order of $ 700 million or more for monster right now .
the federal circuit here affirms that affinity’s challenged claims invalid as directed to an abstract idea. when “stripped of excess claim verbiage”, claim 1 of u. s. patent no. 7, 970, 379 “is directed to a broadcast system in which a cellular telephone located outside the range of a regional broadcaster (1) requests and receives network - based content from the broadcaster via a streaming signal, (2) is configured to wirelessly download an application for performing those functions, and (3) contains a display that allows the user to select particular content. ” slip opinion .
unbeknownst to the user, affinity photo has a tendency to add layers for practically each action or set of actions you perform. and that can lead to confusion. when i attempted to use liquify to warp parts of the image, it failed to work. when i examined the layers tab and noted several layers were generated, i discovered the culprit was all these added layers. selecting the background layer was a quick workaround, as was merging the layers. (note: liquify can also be used to widen the pupils in a portrait, to give a face a more inviting appearance. )
under step one of the mayo / alice analysis, the federal circuit held, similar to the district court, that the concept of delivering user - selected media content to portable devices was an abstract idea according to section 101 of the patent act. affinity contended that the patent - in - suit embodied a technological innovation as of its priority date, which confused novelty with eligibility. the court noted the distinction between eligibility and novelty and found nevertheless that the patent failed to disclose any particular mechanism for wirelessly streaming content to a handheld device. therefore, the patent claims were directed to an abstract idea .
the research—culled from chatter on social media sites including twitter, facebook (public posts only) and tv - focused micro - blogs—is courtesy of bluefin labs, a cambridge, mass. - based social tv analytics firm, which this week shared information about some of the year' s most buzzed about tv programs. (they include mtv' s video music awards, which led the overall list with 3. 15 million comments, and the x factor on fox, which was the top series with an average of 137, 000 comments per telecast .) for adweek, bluefin went deeper, slicing social tv data by brand and audience segment, and then comparing competitive brands (see charts below) .
first, the court held that affinity’s patent claims addressed the function of wirelessly communicating regional broadcast content to an out - of - region recipient, but did not specify how to perform that function. notably, the claimed use of a generic, electronic device, specifically a cellular phone, and a graphical user interface, were insufficient to distinguish the claims from preemption of an abstract idea. additionally, the court noted that the patent - in - suit was not directed to solving a “technological problem, ” nor to an improvement in computer or network functionality. instead, the claims addressed the general concept of out - of - region delivery of broad content, using conventional devices. thus, the court held that the claim was directed to an abstract idea. while the claims were limited to a specific technological environment, cellular phones, such limitations to a specific field of use did not make the claims any less abstract .
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the purchase price for the transaction was approximately $ 61 million in cash. the company does not anticipate the acquisition having a material impact on financial results in 2008. monster was advised by goldman, sachs & co. on the transaction
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the court discussed the framework for determining whether a particular patent claim is directed to patentable subject matter under § 101 of the patent act. specifically, the federal circuit began with the two - stage mayo / alice framework: (1) the “abstract idea” step and (2) the “inventive concept” step .
next, in applying step two of the mayo / alice analysis, the court considered whether “’the claims do significantly more than simply describe [ the ] abstract method’ and thus transform the abstract idea into patentable subject matter. ultramercial, inc. v. hulu, llc, 772 f. 3d 709, 715 (fed. cir. 2014). the court found no “inventive concept” that transformed the abstract idea of out - of - region delivery of regional broadcasting into a patent eligible application of that abstract idea. the court reiterated the supreme court’s alice statements that “generic computer implementation” is insufficient to transform a patent - ineligible abstract idea into a patent - eligible invention. alice corp. v. cls bank international, 134 s. ct. 2347, 2352, 2357 (2014) .
claims utilizing conventional devices without offering any technological means of implementing a targeted concept will likely be patent ineligible under the mayo / alice two - stage framework .
in step two of the patent eligibility analysis, the court concluded that nothing in the claims or specification of the patent constituted a concrete implementation of the abstract idea in form of an “inventive concept” as required under mayo and alice. mayo collaborative services v. prometheus laboratories, inc. , 132 s. ct. 1289, 1294 (2012), and alice corp. v. cls bank international, 134 s. ct. 2347, 2355 (2014). the features in the claims were set forth generically and therefore failed to show how they would provide a concrete solution to the patent’s proposed problem. accordingly, the court upheld the district court’s judgment that the asserted claims of the patent - in - suit were not eligible for patenting .
the addition of basic user customization features to an interface does not alter the otherwise abstract nature of claims and does not add an inventive component that renders the claims patentable .
founded in 1897, troutman sanders llp is an international law firm with more than 650 lawyers practicing in 16 offices located throughout the united states and asia. each week, partners joe robinson and bob schaffer, succinctly summarize the preceding week of federal circuit precedential patent opinions. they provide the pertinent facts, issues, and holdings. this review allows you to keep abreast of the federal circuit’s activities – important for everyone concerned with intellectual property. urltoken is pleased to publish these summaries each week .
joseph robinson has over 20 years of experience in all aspects of intellectual property law. he focuses his practice in the pharmaceutical, life sciences, biotechnology, and medical device fields. his practice encompasses litigation, including hatch - waxman litigation; licensing; counseling; due diligence; and patent and trademark prosecution. he has served as litigation counsel in a variety of patent and trademark disputes in many different jurisdictions, and has also served as appellate counsel before the court of appeals for the federal circuit. joe also focuses on complex inter partes matters before the u. s patent and trademark office, inventorship disputes, reexaminations and reissues. his experience includes numerous interferences, a particular advantage in new u. s. patent and trademark office post - grant proceedings. he also counsels on patent–related u. s. food and drug administration issues, including citizen petitions, orange book listing, and trademark issues. for more information and to contact joe please visit his profile page at the troutman sanders website .
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instead, the claims addressed the general concept of out - of - region delivery of broad content, using conventional devices. thus, the court held that the claim was directed to an abstract idea. when your alleged abstract idea describes something that necessarily involves technology, it isn’t an “abstract idea. ” it isn’t abstract. it isn’t an idea .
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bryson, william c. ; prost, sharon; wallach, evan j. ; authored by bryson
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these sites, while only a few months old and attracting a total of only 800, 000 unique visitors per month, are attractive to monster because it can use them to target professionals who are in high demand by employers. the sites are essentially cookie - cutter information portals with social networking features that seek to attract members of particular demographics. monster has already established a presence on each of the sites by deploying career search badges, like the one below, on their homepages .
a couple things are peculiar about this deal. first, monster has paid a handsome sum of money for a company that offers neither a large user base nor coveted technological capabilities (as far as i can tell, these are simple crud websites built on ruby on rails). second, monster is retreading very familiar ground by purchasing several informational portals from the same guy, christopher michel, who sold them urltoken, an information portal for servicemen, in 2004 for $ 40m .
with today’s announcement, michel’s plan of building a company with a specific monster exit in mind has come to fruition. whether michel stays with the company will probably determine whether or not monster has paid too much for the sprouting company, as he will be instrumental to their blossoming into established sites that can drive quality traffic to monster .
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owen dr 1, gunn rn, rabiner ea, bennacef i, fujita m, kreisl wc, innis rb, pike vw, reynolds r, matthews pm, parker ca .
division of experimental medicine, imperial college, hammersmith hospital, london, united kingdom. d. owen @ urltoken
pmid: 21149489 pmcid: pmc3161826 doi: 10. 2967 / jnumed. 110. 079459
competition assay with 3 h - pk11195 and unlabeled pbr28, using tissue from donors with no history of neurologic disease. each data point represents mean value of all subjects, and error bars represent sem. conc = concentration .
competition assays with 3 h - pk11195 and unlabeled tspo ligand using brain tissue previously characterized as hab, lab, or mab by pbr28 assays. each data point represents mean value of at least 4 subjects, and error bars represent sem. (a) phenoxyphenyl acetamide derivatives. (b) bicyclic linker derivatives. (c) phenyl–isoquinolinecarboxamide derivatives. conc = concentration; sb = specific binding .
competition assays with 3 h - pk11195 and unlabeled pbr111 in presence or absence of pbr28 (50 nm) .
11 c - pbr28 pet data from 32 healthy volunteers expressed as histogram with mixture model analysis showing 2 distributions for each measurement. (a) volume of distribution. (b) plasma free fraction. (c) volume of distribution / plasma free fraction. blue curves denote single - component solutions, and green and black curves denote 2 - component solutions. for 2 - component solutions, whereas different individuals are within each gaussian group (e. g. , green) for 3 parameters, there was good agreement between a and b (74 %) and a and c (66 %) .
to reach consumers most likely to mention walmart on social media, marketers might have luck targeting shows with, well, less than lofty themes .
recently released research shows that people who create online buzz about walmart are most likely to tweet or comment about lifetime’s america’s supernanny, cmt’s dallas cowboys cheerleaders: making the team and trutv’s las vegas jailhouse .
people chattering about target, on the other hand, seem to go for more wholesome tv fare. consumers who use social media to discuss the chain also comment on cooking and home makeover programs like cmt’s top secret recipe and hgtv' s my yard goes disney .
“brands really want the shows with the most social conversations as it applies to their brand [ as well as ] other brands... or audiences or lifestyle segments that they care about, ” thai said .
other agency and brand clients include wpp’s mediacom, ipg’s initiative, mars and pepsico .
espnews, for example, leads the top 10 list for coke with a show index of 234, which means that people socially vocal about coke are more than twice as likely to tweet or talk about that particular program. of the top 10 shows that overindex for coke conversations, three are on espn. but among all of the shows that overindex for coke (111 in total), tlc is the most represented, followed by espn .
by contrast, the top 10 for people who tweet and talk about pepsi doesn’t include a single show about sports. the mortified sessions on sundance leads the list, followed by the exes on tv land and prophets of science fiction on science. nick jr. was the leading network for pepsi, with abc, nbc and tlc tied for second .
thai acknowledged that social tv data is in some ways influenced by a brand or sector’s media spend (for example, beer marketers already target sports shows so it makes sense that social media chatter reflects that). but he said that in working with brand and agency clients, they can look at the data through current media plans to measure the impact of campaigns on social media and generate more specific insights .
“social tv is not just about how much people talk during the shows, ” thai said. “the programming is one big part of tv, but what people say about brands and commercials is also, obviously, a big part. we’ll be able to, in 2012, tell a lot more interesting stories about how real - world audiences in social media react to tv campaigns and react to brands. ”
alice step 1: considering these limitations and the claim’s “character as a whole” the court identified the concept of “providing out - of - region access to regional broadcast content” as an unpatentable abstract idea. the court explained its conclusion by noting that the practice (1) has been long employed in media distribution; (2) is not tied to any particular technology; and (3) could be implemented by very low - tech technology such as via mail. the court went on to explain that (4) nothing in the claim “is directed to how to implement out - of - region broadcasting on a cellular telephone. rather, the claim is drawn to the idea itself. ” and, (5) unlike in enfish, the claims are not directed to “an improvement in cellular telephones but simply to the use of cellular telephones as tools. ” taking all these together, the court found the claim was in fact directed to an abstract idea .
alice step 2: step two of alice indicates that a patent directed to an abstract idea is patent eligible if it claims “additional features” that constitute an “inventive concept” that go beyond “well - understood, routine, conventional activity. ” mayo. here, the court found no such additional features. “the claim simply recites the use of generic features of cellular telephones, such as a storage medium and a graphical user interface, as well as routine functions, such as transmitting and receiving signals, to implement the underlying idea. that is not enough. ” slip opinion at 15 - 16 .
to receive a streaming media signal in the wireless cellular telephone device corresponding to the regional broadcasting channel, wherein the wireless cellular telephone device is outside of a broadcast region of the regional broadcasting channel, wherein the wireless cellular telephone device is configured to receive the application via an over the air download .
does anyone know which case the federal circuit was quoting from at the bottom of page 6 of the opinion. the court states that “the ‘abstract idea’ step of the inquiry calls upon us to look at the ‘focus of the claimed advance over the prior art’... ” any idea where this is coming from? no citation was provided. i don’t remember the court every saying that we look at prior art under step 1. the next citation in the opinion was to elec. power but that language was not found in that case. thanks ,
mike, the supreme court has historically looked to the substance of the claimed invention so as to focus in the patentable advance. this is why the courts have excluded insignificant activity appended to otherwise ineligible subject matter. the first case that said this that i am aware of is flook. but it is a common theme .
mayo gave us the analysis that one needed to apply subject matter that was otherwise ineligible, in that case, a law of nature, to some inventive application. alice took this analysis to apply it to the “abstract” prong of the tripartite exclusions: natural phenomena, laws of nature, and abstract ideas .
“ substance of the claimed invention ” aka “gist of the invention” aka dozens of other names – explicitly rejected by congress in the act of 1952, wherein they opted instead to create and implement obviousness in 35 usc 103 .
anon, there is a difference between asking whether what is new is obvious and whether what is new is patentable subject matter .
absolutely ned. – and congress acted in 1952 in response to an out of control supreme court to constrain the court’s failure to set the meaning of “invention” (and alll of those terms pertaining to thus, like “gist of the invention”) as i have detailed for you time and again .
ya i got that part. what i don’t understand is why it’s being applied in step 1. my understanding is that any novetly, if relevant at all, comes in under step two. i’ve never seen a court say that step 1 requires us to compare the invention to “prior art. ” do examiner now need to cite prior art to support a rejection under step 1 (and 2) of alice ?
for 101 purposes, first step should be whether the claimed subject matter includes patent ineligible subject matter. if not the claims should certainly pass 101. it simply cannot be that all claims are directed to ineligible abstract ideas .
1) solving a technological problem; or 2) to an improvement in computer or network functionality .
during step 2 we ask, is there an inventive application. if so, the claim is patentable. but if there is an inventive application, couldn’t or shouldn’t the claims pass step 1 as well ?
…and once again, you misstate the law as it is today with your curse - ade against business method patents… .
i invented that, question for you, since you’ve been very big on “well 112 applies, use 112. ” let’s take the prominent wd case of lizardtech .
lizardtech dealt with software. one of skill finds coding to be a merely clerical act – i. e. once you know what you want to code, at least for information processing like this is, the coding is trivial. thus enablement is generally met .
lizardtech had claim 1, which was limited by “maintaining updated sums” and “periodically compressing the sums. ” claim 1 was not infringed because the defendant did not do those things. claim 21 lacked those limitations, and thus the defendant was infringing. claim 21 was found to lack written description support, because the specification provided only one manner of achieving seamless dwt – by maintaining updated sums .
the trouble with allowing claim 21 to cover all ways of performing dwt - based compression processes that lead to a seamless dwt is that there is no support for such a broad claim in the specification. the specification provides only a single way of creating a seamless dwt, which is by maintaining updated sums of dwt coefficients. there is no evidence that the specification contemplates a more generic way of creating a seamless array of dwt coefficients .
in other words, the court recognizes that claim 21 is overbroad of the disclosure because the disclosure is directed to a specific means and claim 21 is directed to a genus .
the court then goes on to say this: “a claim will not be invalidated on section 112 grounds simply because the embodiments of the specification do not contain examples explicitly covering the full scope of the claim language. see union oil co. v. atl. richfield co. , 208 f. 3d 989, 997 (fed. cir. 2000). that is because the patent specification is written for a person of skill in the art, and such a person comes to the patent with the knowledge of what has come before. in re gpac inc. , 57 f. 3d 1573, 1579 (fed. cir. 1995). placed in that context, it is unnecessary to spell out every detail of the invention in the specification; only enough must be included to convince a person of skill in the art that the inventor possessed the invention and to enable such a person to make and use the invention without undue experimentation.
affinity labs is a company that builds social networking sites for niche groups such as firefighters , police officers , nurses and the armed forces . in january 2008 , affinity labs was acquired by monster worldwide for us$ 61 million . affinity labs sites have over a million registered members , as of january 2008 . policelink , aimed at law enforcement personnel , is one of affinity labs ' most active sites with over 717,000 unique visitors per month . other sites include : saleshq , artbistro , theapple , firelink , nursinglink , insidetech , govcentral , indiaon , excelle , allhealthcare , and the european communities , urltoken , pronurse , and werpflegtwen . in 2008 after monster acquired affinity labs , it then bought a french military website , urltoken for an undisclosed fee , then transferred the site to its affinity labs social networking vertical . affinity labs still successfully operate across north america but in march 2012 it shut down its european operations . despite urltoken being its most successful vertical , and having shared resources with military.com , the global recession did not assist its longevity . urltoken still has a strong presence on social networking sites to this day , evidence of its popularity . further references to this military vertical can be found on uk e-commerce sites , and there is also a hmforces blog still surviving despite it not being updated regularly . 
affinity labs is a company that builds social networking sites for niche groups such as firefighters, police officers, nurses and the armed forces. in january 2008, affinity labs was acquired by monster worldwide for us$ 61 million. affinity labs sites have over a million registered members, as of january 2008. policelink, aimed at law enforcement personnel, is one of affinity labs' most active sites with over 717,000 unique visitors per month. other sites include: saleshq, artbistro, theapple, firelink, nursinglink, insidetech, govcentral, indiaon, excelle, allhealthcare, and the european communities, urltoken, pronurse, and werpflegtwen. in 2008 after monster acquired affinity labs, it then bought a french military website, urltoken for an undisclosed fee, then transferred the site to its affinity labs social networking vertical. affinity labs still successfully operate across north america but in march 2012 it shut down its european operations. despite urltoken being its most successful vertical, and having shared resources with military.com, the global recession did not assist its longevity. urltoken still has a strong presence on social networking sites to this day, evidence of its popularity. further references to this military vertical can be found on uk e-commerce sites, and there is also a hmforces blog still surviving despite it not being updated regularly.
affinity labs is a company that builds social networking sites for niche groups such as firefighters, police officers, nurses and the armed forces. in january 2008, affinity labs was acquired by monster worldwide for us$ 61 million. affinity labs sites have over a million registered members, as of january 2008. policelink, aimed at law enforcement personnel, is one of affinity labs' most active sites with over 717,000 unique visitors per month. other sites include: saleshq, artbistro, theapple, firelink, nursinglink, insidetech, govcentral, indiaon, excelle, allhealthcare, and the european communities, urltoken, pronurse, and werpflegtwen. in 2008 after monster acquired affinity labs, it then bought a french military website, urltoken for an undisclosed fee, then transferred the site to its affinity labs social networking vertical. affinity labs still successfully operate across north america but in march 2012 it shut down its european operations. despite urltoken being its most successful vertical, and having shared resources with military.com, the global recession did not assist its longevity. urltoken still has a strong presence on social networking sites to this day, evidence of its popularity. further references to this military vertical can be found on uk e-commerce sites, and there is also a hmforces blog still surviving despite it not being updated regularly.