Comments on: Q) Titanium Baseball (MPEP 2100, Public Use or Printed Publication)

By: Sol

Sol — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 20:17:41 +0000

If a base ball is displayed in a museum open to the public, is it in public use? Does Public Use have to be a use in its intended/natural way? Like, the base ball is used in a baseball game or practice.

Also, is there any difference between 102(a) used by others and 102(b) public use? On words only, I can imagin secret use by others is still 102(a) use but not 102(b) public use.

By: Sol

Sol — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 20:11:48 +0000

I have the same question about “use”, used in its natural intended way or not? Here I am only sure a display of a paper describing the base ball is in no way a use of the base ball, regardless in its natural/intended way or other use.

By: Miranda

Miranda — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 18:10:03 +0000

Sol, wouldn’t you think that in order for public use to occur, the baseball would have to be used during a baseball game (natural and intended use) rather than just being displayed?

Can someone explain the difference between 102(a) “use” and 102(b) “use”?

By: Sol

Sol — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 07:09:48 +0000

To qualify public use, the display should be a display of the invention, the baseball, not the paper.

Also, I don’t quite agree that public use date and prior art date are mutually exclusive. In my opinion, public use is a type of prior art, and public use date is a type of prior art date.

By: lily

lily — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 16:46:04 +0000

Seems like people have only been getting Variant 2 (july 4th, cataloged/indexed). Has anyone gotten variant 1 (public use)? what is the answer to that one?

By: Ricky

Ricky — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 06:21:17 +0000

MPEP2128–” available to the extent that persons interested and ordinarily skilled in the subject matter or art, exercising reasonable diligence, can locate it.” will make a 102(a).

Therefore my concusion is

1. For a publication in library, audience must be those with interest to make a publication 102(a). The question posted by Alex clearly states that “The members of the club were wealthy individuals who were baseball fans, but had no interest in the design, development, manufacture, use, or sale of baseballs.” Therefore the paper is not 102(a). IF without this statement, it will became 102(a) on Jan 2004, when being catalogued under subject.

2. . For public display/uese, any audience, no matter with interest or not, will make it 102(b), of course the timemust be more than one eyar ago. As in variant 1.

any comments?

By: KF

KF — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 18:22:22 +0000

Anyone had this more recently?

By: BigBadVoodoDaddy

BigBadVoodoDaddy — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 23:20:09 +0000

Would an advertisement count as public use (display) if that was a choice?

By: Freds

Freds — Sun, 22 May 2011 09:40:45 +0000

I think the key to public access test to determine publication date for 102(a)/(b) purpose is accessibility to any member of the public. If the library is just open to wealthy patrons, that’s probably not public accessible within the meaning of the public access under 102(a)/(b) identity rule. That said, I think this is really a poor fact pattern. How long is the article? Could it be remembered by anybody who read it ?

As to the public use variant, the 2133 II A.2 has a large qualification “if the invention is otherwise used in its natural and intended way and the larger machine or article is accessible to the public”. Is the baseball, sitting on a museum display, used in its natural and intended way? Again poor fact patten.

By: Inessa

Inessa — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 23:01:42 +0000

I had this on today’s exam and chose July 4th as priority date because that’s when it was indexed.