On 07/23/2018 10:25 AM, Bruce Momjian wrote:
>> Isn't 'defensive', in patent-speak, used to mean 'establishing prior
>> art usable to challenge future patent claims by others on the same
>> technique'?
>>
>> Is there any way that conditions of use, or lack of them, on an
>> existing patent, would make it unusable in that context?
>
> It doesn't have to be a patent on the same technique; this URL was
> referenced in the thread:
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defensive_termination
Ah, a very different understanding of defensive use of a patent,
and one that I can see would lose force if there could be no
conditions on its use.
I was thinking more of the use of a filing to establish prior art
so somebody else later can't obtain and enforce a patent on
the technique that you're already using. Something along the lines
of a statutory invention registration[1], which used to be a thing
in the US, but now apparently is not, though any filed, published
application, granted or abandoned, can serve the same purpose.
That, I think, would still work.
-Chap
[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Statutory_Invention_Registration