So You Want to File Your Own Patent Application… Here is an Example of What Not to Do

January 3, 2008 admin 599 Views

You may recall from one of my prior posts titled “I Don’t Perform My Own Dentistry… “The Perfect Golf Tee” Patent Application Illustrates Why Most People Should Not Attempt to Draft Their Own Patent Applications” that some people are under the impression that applying for a patent is like applying for a drivers license. Guess what… it is not! As I have previously mentioned, not a week goes by in which I don’t receive a call from an inventor that believes that filing a patent application is similar to completing a driver’s license application (i.e. just a matter of completing some forms). Such inventors are often disgusted and mad that preparing a patent application is a lot of work, and therefore not inexpensive. I frequently direct them to self-help legal books on patent application drafting and tell them that if they read it from cover-to-cover at least twice, and follow the directions step-by-step, then they should be able to draft their own patent application. I have yet to see someone actually do it (let alone do it well).

Since patent law is a pretty dry complex subject, one must find comic relief whenever possible. A recently published patent application provides just such comic relief. The published patent application is US Pub. No. 20070287559 titled “EcoSmart Golf Tee.” Experienced inventors know that the claims of a patent application are the legal description of the invention; in other words… the most important part. Perhaps the most fundamental rule in patent prosecution is that each claim is a single sentence (i.e. one period at the very end). This is why it is always fun (and sad) to see a patent application containing a single proposed claim that is written in paragraph form, as if the inventor is describing the invention to his buddies at the 19th hole. Check out this invention’s claim.

1. The invention described and claimed herein is not to be limited in scope by the specific embodiments herein disclosed, since these embodiments are intended solely as illustration of several aspects of the invention. Any equivalent embodiments and various modifications apparent to those skilled in the art are intended to be within the scope of this invention. It is further understood that the various features of the present invention can be used singly or in combination thereof. Such modifications and combinations are also intended to fall within the scope of the appended claims.

The format of the application leads me to believe that the inventors used some form of self-help patent application drafting software to write the application. Oh well, hopefully they had fun (heck, I am sure all of us have wasted more money on the latest great golf product than these inventors wasted on the USPTO filing fee).

Dave Dawsey – The Golf Patent Lawyer

PS – click here to see why the same is true for trademark applications