F. Questier, W. Schreurs, The Open Patent Office: stimulating innovation by providing an open, free & social alternative to traditional patent offices, Presentation at Brussels Legal Hackers Demo Night #3, Brussels, 2018

1. The Open Patent Office
OpenPatentOffice.org @OpenPatentOffic
Frederik Questier & Wim Schreurs
Presented at Brussels Legal Hackers Demo Night #3 20/02/2018

3. Dear innovators,
are your inventions
well-protected?

4. Dear innovators,
are your inventions
well-protected?
Why?
What could happen?

5. Dear innovators,
are your inventions
well-protected?
Why?
What could happen?
Somebody else
could obtain a patent
for your invention
and block you.

6. Dear innovators,
are your inventions
well-protected?
Why?
What could happen?
Somebody else
could obtain a patent
for your invention
and block you.
Solutions?

7. Dear innovators,
are your inventions
well-protected?
Why?
What could happen?
Somebody else
could obtain a patent
for your invention
and block you.
(Trade) secrets
Patents
Defensive publications
Solutions?

8. Defensive publications
Sharing
an enabling description
of your invention
to protect your
“freedom to operate”

9. Defensive publications
are great if...
➢ you can’t keep (trade) secrets
➢ you don’t want a monopoly
➢ a patent wouldn’t be profitable
➢ you don’t want to file patents in each country
➢ you don’t want a slow and difficult publication
process

10. Current
defensive publication
implementations?

11. Research Disclosure
(~1000/year? - publication fees – paywall)

12. IP.com Prior Art Database
(~10.000/year? - publication fees – paywall)

13. Defensive Publications from Linux Defenders
(156 publications - inactive since 2015?)

14. Noneof the current
defensive publication implementations
have the popularity, impact or openness
that the concept deserves...

15. We need something better...

16. The Open Patent Office
Non-profit organisation

17. The Open Patent Office
Non-profit organisation
Stimulating open innovation
Strengthening the public domain

18. The Open Patent Office
Non-profit organisation
Stimulating open innovation
Strengthening the public domain
Combining the best practices
of defensive publications,
the patent offices
and open discussions

20. Easy publication process
➢ Guided web form
➢ Title
➢ Author(s) and associated organizations (or anonymous)
➢ Abstract - summary
➢ Background - problem statement - prior art
➢ Enabling description & novelty claims
➢ References
➢ Figures
➢ Immediate publication

21. Authenticity and integrity of the data
➢ Cryptographic hashes
➢ Cryptographic signatures
➢ Blockchain
➢ OpenTimeStamps.org
➢ External database mirrors

22. Improve searchability & findability
(foremost for patent examiners)
➢ International Patent
Classification
➢ Tags
➢ Search engine
➢ API
➢ RSS-feeds
➢ Facilitate citations
➢ …

23. Improve quality
➢ Guidance
➢ Enabling description
➢ Ratings
➢ Reviews

24. Stimulate open innovation
➢ Open access
➢ Creative Commons
license
➢ Comments
➢ Discussions
➢ Enable requests for
prior art
➢ Enable requests for
solutions

25. Empower innovators
Boost reputation
➢ Open patent No xxxxxx
➢ Inventor profile page
➢ Open Badges
➢ Rankings

27. Prelaunch status
All support very welcome
Challenges
➢ Funding – business models
➢ Development
➢ Spam & (multilingual) bullshit detection
➢ Good (IPC) meta data
OpenPatentOffice.org
mail AT OpenPatentOffice.org
@openpatentoffic
Open Patent Office
Open Patent Office
Slideshare.net/OpenPatentOffice
Questions?
Com
m
ents?
Support?

28. Credits
Cite as: F. Questier, W. Schreurs, The Open Patent Office: stimulating innovation by
providing an open, free & social alternative to traditional patent offices, Presentation at
Brussels Legal Hackers Demo Night #3, Brussels, 2018
This presentation is copyright Frederik Questier, Wim Schreurs & The Open Patent Office,
licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license. This license may not apply to
the pictures, including:
➢
Science Hack Day, CC BY-SA by re:publica Gregor Fischer
➢
Screenshot http://priorart.ip.com/IPCOM/000135116
➢
Screenshot http://www.researchdisclosure.com/searching-disclosures/search
➢
Screenshot http://www.defensivepublications.org/publications
➢
The anatomy of an idea, Copyright Sylvia Duckworth, free to use non-commercially, with attribution
➢
Timestamp by Oxfordian Kissuth, CC BY-SA 3.0
➢
Magnifying glass by Jefrey Beall, CC BY-SA 2.0
➢
Rating list by Jvleis, CC BY-SA 2.0
➢
OPEN by Rebecca Siegel, CC BY 2.0
➢
GNU Head Joseph W. Reiss Free Art License or the GNU GPLv2
➢
Social Icons by Iconshock http://www.iconshock.com/social-icons/