Gross error in the eBay brief to Supreme Court in MercExchange case
In November 2005, there was a post on IPBiz strongly questioning the accuracy of a footnote (and related main text) in the law review article by Gideon Parchomovsky and R. Polk Wagner, 154 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1 (Nov. 2005):
Incredibly, footnote 76 is to the first Quillen/Webster paper: See, e.g., Cecil D. Quillen, Jr. & Ogden H. Webster, Continuing Patent Applications and Performance of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, 11 Fed. Cir. B.J. 1, 3 (2001) (indicating that once continuing applications are included, the patent approval rate is 95%). Quillen and Webster conclude that the PTO might ultimately approve as many as 97% of all patent applications. Id. at 13.
Fast forward to January 2006, and we have in the Brief of petitioner, eBay, at the Supreme Court [by (among others) Jeffrey G. Randall (Skadden Arps), Carter G. Phillips (Sidley Austin) ] at p. 40:
Generally, when reexamination occurs, one recent article states that nearly 74% of the time finds the patent invalid or restricts its claims. (…) This result is unsurprising given that an overworked PTO can spend a mere 18 hours on average to review a patent application before initial issuance. [citing to Parchomovsky (but not mentioning co-author Polk Wagner), 154 U Penn L Rev 1 and then citing to Cecil Quillen (but not mentioning co-author Webster), specifically the FIRST Quillen/Webster paper, 11 Fed. Cir. B J 1 (estimating the rate of patent approvals by the PTO to be 97%).
Please note that the 97% number is not correct. It was modified EVEN BY Quillen and Webster in the second Quillen/Webster paper. The first paper by Quillen and Webster was strongly criticized by Clarke in JPTOS and the second paper was strongly criticized by me in JPTOS. Yet, the 97% number has now ended up in a brief to the US Supreme Court.
It appears that the authors of the eBay brief may have looked only to the Parchomovsky/Wagner paper without examining the work of Quillen/Webster or the numerous criticisms of Quillen/Webster. In the end, it is sloppy scholarship by Parchomovsky/Wagner and the cite checkers at the University of Pennsylvania Law Review that facilitated this error, now sent to the US Supreme Court.
NOTE: Dennis Crouch at Patently O observed the presence of the 97% number in the eBay brief and forwarded a copy of the brief to me.
For those interested in an analysis of the errors (both numerical and legal) in the approach of Quillen and Webster, one can refer to papers published in
2004 and in 2005.
Incredibly, footnote 76 is to the first Quillen/Webster paper: See, e.g., Cecil D. Quillen, Jr. & Ogden H. Webster, Continuing Patent Applications and Performance of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, 11 Fed. Cir. B.J. 1, 3 (2001) (indicating that once continuing applications are included, the patent approval rate is 95%). Quillen and Webster conclude that the PTO might ultimately approve as many as 97% of all patent applications. Id. at 13.
Fast forward to January 2006, and we have in the Brief of petitioner, eBay, at the Supreme Court [by (among others) Jeffrey G. Randall (Skadden Arps), Carter G. Phillips (Sidley Austin) ] at p. 40:
Generally, when reexamination occurs, one recent article states that nearly 74% of the time finds the patent invalid or restricts its claims. (…) This result is unsurprising given that an overworked PTO can spend a mere 18 hours on average to review a patent application before initial issuance. [citing to Parchomovsky (but not mentioning co-author Polk Wagner), 154 U Penn L Rev 1 and then citing to Cecil Quillen (but not mentioning co-author Webster), specifically the FIRST Quillen/Webster paper, 11 Fed. Cir. B J 1 (estimating the rate of patent approvals by the PTO to be 97%).
Please note that the 97% number is not correct. It was modified EVEN BY Quillen and Webster in the second Quillen/Webster paper. The first paper by Quillen and Webster was strongly criticized by Clarke in JPTOS and the second paper was strongly criticized by me in JPTOS. Yet, the 97% number has now ended up in a brief to the US Supreme Court.
It appears that the authors of the eBay brief may have looked only to the Parchomovsky/Wagner paper without examining the work of Quillen/Webster or the numerous criticisms of Quillen/Webster. In the end, it is sloppy scholarship by Parchomovsky/Wagner and the cite checkers at the University of Pennsylvania Law Review that facilitated this error, now sent to the US Supreme Court.
NOTE: Dennis Crouch at Patently O observed the presence of the 97% number in the eBay brief and forwarded a copy of the brief to me.
For those interested in an analysis of the errors (both numerical and legal) in the approach of Quillen and Webster, one can refer to papers published in
2004 and in 2005.
posted by Lawrence B. Ebert at 9:38 PM
2 Comments:
If you are correct about the scholarship of Parchomovsky & Wagner, then I'm sorry to say it wouldn't be the first time that their scholarship raises questions.
See, e.g., their article "Patent Potfolios" (U.Penn.L.Rev. November 2005) http://ssrn.com/abstract=582201 , which presents as a "new theory" of their own creation the idea that a portfolio of patents has a value greater than the sum of values of individual patents. On the contrary, this theory has been known to in-house patent counsel for decades. And it's been relied on at least since the times of the Haber-Bosch ammonia process portfolio, ca. 1910. (See also, e.g., H. Jackson Knight, _Patent Stretegy for Researchers and Research Managers 2nd ed._ (Wiley 2001) at 48-53.)
Another case is the paper by Polk Wagner, "Information Wants to be Free" http://ssrn.com/abstract=419560, in which a mathematical model is presented that claims to demonstrate that over time, the amount of appropriable information in the public domain will grow faster in the presence of constraints on appropriability (IPR) than in their absence. According to the paper, such growth requires the lapse of several time periods for the benefits to be felt, but the duration of a time period is never calculated or proposed. However, a calculation shows that the claims are fallacious, since one time period for the model (which can be shown to be simply an exponential growth model) is the term of the IPR in question, after which constraints expire anyway.
I raised all of these comments in writing to the authors over a year ago, but was never favored with a reply. Clearly, one must apply a very critical eye before relying on any of Parchomovsky"s or Wagner's papers.
This momentousdecree warcraft leveling came as a great beacon light wow lvl of hope to millions of negroslaves wow power level who had been seared power leveling in the flames of power leveling withering wrath of the lich king power leveling injustice.wrath of the lich king power leveling it came as a WOTLK Power Leveling joyous daybreak to end the long WOTLK Power Leveling night ofcaptivity.WOTLK Power Leveling but one hundred years wlk power leveling later, we must face aoc gold the tragic fact thatthe age of conan power leveling negro is still not free. aoc power leveling one hundred years later,age of conan power leveling the lifeof the negro ffxi gil is still sadly crippled by the final fantasy xi gil manacles ofsegregation guild wars gold and the chains of discrimination. one hundred yearslater, maplestory mesos the negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in themidst of a vast ocean of material prosperity.dog clothes one hundred yearslater, the negro is still languishing in the corners of americansociety and finds himself an exile in his own land.
Post a Comment
<< Home