Summary of 7 November 2003 HTML PAG teleconference

Hello,

   The HTML Patent Advisory Group (PAG) held a short meeting on 7
   November 2003. Ten people attended. The PAG approved the minutes and
   reviewed action items from the previous meeting: prior art is in the
   process of being collected, and the scribe has compiled mainly US
   press highlights for the group's reference.

   The Chair reported on a phone call with Pennie & Edmonds [1] who
   represented W3C. They are confident in their filing, and while
   compiling more prior art may be useful it is not timely for the PAG
   to actually develop additional cases.

   A PAG participant commented that based on its antitrust and IPR
   hearings last year the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has
   published their report [2] which contains a section indicating that the
   FTC will ask the USPTO Director in appropriate circumstances to
   re-examine questionable patents that raise competitive concerns. The
   PAG participant thought that W3C might consider sending a letter to
   the FTC regarding the Eolas patent.

   The group discussed what the USPTO process for re-examination
   entails. It is thought that their decision to re-examine or not will
   be made public. The re-examination itself is not an exchange with
   W3C, rather it would be a dialog with Eolas that might take a year.
   Re-examination is claim by claim, i.e., some, none, or all of the
   claims in the '906 patent could be found to be invalid. The applicant
   may submit more claims, and may appeal. If the USPTO decides to
   re-examine, W3C may submit more prior art to help the examiner.

   The HTML PAG meets next on 5 December.

[1] http://www.pennie.com/home.ihtml
[2] http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2003/10/cpreport.htm

Best wishes,
-- 
Susan Lesch           http://www.w3.org/People/Lesch/
mailto:lesch@w3.org               tel:+1.858.483.4819
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)    http://www.w3.org/

Received on Saturday, 15 November 2003 19:39:32 UTC