Big difference between filing patent app and introducing commercial product

A line at tvg has some wisdom that some business/legal academics overlook: Now naturally there’s a big difference between filing for a patent and releasing a peripheral onto the shop shelves,... Checking for things like novelty is the job of the USPTO; checking for commercializability is the job of businessmen.

Prior to the unveiling of the Revolution's controller, Nintendo was adamant that others would copy its vision, however they probably weren’t expecting others to follow suit so quickly. Based on a published patent application, it appears Sony may have plans to introduce a movement wand similar in scope to the Revolution’s controller.

If Sony's device does come to fruition it means that Sony had been thinking about this concept prior to January 2004 – it’s either a case of “great minds…” or they had their AIBO spies infiltrate Nintendo’s Kyoto headquarters. [info from tvg;
http://www.totalvideogames.com/news/]

Recall that in the case of the transistor, there were competing groups both in the US and in France that were right behind Bell Labs back in 1947. In the case of the integrated circuit, there was a patent interference between Texas Instruments and Fairchild. The interference was ultimately won by Fairchild, but Texas Instruments made the better (later) business deals, especially as to Japan.