Design Patents and Patent Reform

My sister was a design examiner at the USPTO for a year, before leaving to become a vegan cooking author and chef. The design group at the PTO has always been different to the utility examiners. When I was a PTO utility examiner, the design examiners I knew were usually architects and other visual design experts. Supposedly on the whole they are "more normal" have "interpersonal skills" and "dress well" - whatever that means.

 

Anyway, enforcement is a very real challenge for design patents. Today Patently-O had a good summary of design patents recently protecting a US automobile manufacturer.

 

The interesting thing here is apparently after the ITC ruling, the losing party immediately joined the patent reform movement.

View article at Patently-O