Posts Tagged: "URAA"

CAFC Tells Gil Hyatt ‘GATT Bubble’ Application Properly Subject to Restriction Requirement

Inventor Gilbert Hyatt, who has been embroiled in litigation with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for decades, lost his latest case at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) when the court ruled today that an examiner’s restriction requirement was permitted under 37 C.F.R. § 1.129 (“Rule 129”). The case relates to Hyatt’s U.S. Patent Application No. 08/435,938, which was filed on May 5, 1995, and falls within the so-called “GATT Bubble.” The GATT Bubble is the term applied to patent applications filed but not yet granted before the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), which amended the U.S. patent term to 20 years from the effective filing date, took effect on June 8, 1995.

Supreme Court OKs Public Domain Works Being Copyrighted

To all those who can read the Constitution it has to be clear that the Supreme Court’s decision in Golan v. Holder is absurd. It is a ridiculous decision that lacks intellectual honesty and defies common sense. Further, the facts of this case provide ample ground for the suspicions of many who wonder why it is that the United States is so interested in losing its identity and compromising Constitutional principles in order to facilitate some ill conceived plan to join the world community. Simply stated, treaties and international law cannot trump the Constitution. With all due respect to the six Justices who ruled in favor of stripping works from the public domain, the Constitution does not support this decision and any attempts to argue to the contrary are insulting and show a contemptuous understanding of the history and role of intellectual property in America.