Re: An IP gripe

On Wed, 25 Aug 1999, Terry Carroll <carroll[_at_]tjc.com> wrote:
>
> One reason I'm not a patent lawyer is that my CS degree predates the
> PTO's recognition of CS as a technical degree,[1] and I'm unwilling
> to go back to school for a third to get a degree I don't care about
> or to study subjects that don't interest me, just to qualify to take
> a test. The OED gave zero weight to my 12-year career in the computer
> industry, including my position as Senior Computer Architect at a
> major mainframe computer company.

Well, I spent 15 years doing software work, and the PTO gave it zero weight also. I essentially had to take another year of grad school after law school (at nights, but still) to get enough hours.

Interestingly (at least to me), the PTO used to accept some work experience instead of formal education. But that ended at exactly the same time that they began to accept CS courses and degrees (1991).

> This isn't as gripy as it sounds. I can appreciate that the CS
> curricula are pretty inconsistent among various universities, and
> that it would be possible to get a CS degree without really gaining
> any true technical knowledge. But the bottom line is that the PTO
> is looking for techinal education rather than technical competence,
> presumably because, from a bureaucratic point of view, it's easier
> to measure, and there's value in having bright-line tests like this,
> even if it excludes some qualified people from practice, if it also
> excludes more unqualified people.

I think that this is a very shrewd analysis.

> (I should also note that the OED recognizes passing the state
> engineering exam as an alternate qualification to take the exam.)

Which is really less than irrelevant when considering software patent applications. Knowing where Terry used to work, and what he used to do, I would find his expertise far more useful in writing software (and even many of the type of electronic patents that I write) than that required to pass a state engineering exam.

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The preceding was not a legal opinion, and is not my employer's.
Original portions Copyright 1999 Bruce E. Hayden,all rights reserved
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Bruce E. Hayden                      bhayden[_at_]acm.org
Phoenix, Arizona                     bhayden[_at_]ieee.org
                                     bhayden[_at_]copatlaw.com