W3C Eolas Prior Art Dropped?

--> From http://www.eweek.com/print_article/0,1761,a=133765,00.asp

According to patent office spokeswoman Brigid Quinn, 
Eolas on Monday was mailed an "office action" on the 
re-examination of the disputed patent. A number of 
online reports said the patent office examiner decided 
to reject the 10 claims presented by Eolas.

But Eolas attorney Martin Lueck, of Minneapolis-based 
Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi LLP, said the examiner 
had accepted a number of Eolas' arguments and had 
withdrawn his previous finding from February. 

Lueck said the patent office examiner had issued 
a new action based on yet another piece of 
"prior art" to reject the patent's claims. The prior-art
piece was outside the examples offered by the W3C 
(World Wide Web Consortium), which brought the prior-art
question to the attention of the patent office in November 
2003. 

Prior art is a legal term referring to whether an 
invention existed prior to the filing of a patent. 
But this "piece of art" was not addressed in the 
February action, he said, hence the reversal. 

"We're back to square one," Lueck said.