Further to Bob's comments on the Journal of Negative Results - I thought
at the time (i) I have enough trouble tracking the positive ones! and
(ii) we already have something along these lines - it's called legal
status.
I suggest that the intelligent combination of (positive searching) +
(determination of whether the cases found have had a request for
substantive examination filed) = a de facto Journal of Negative Results.
Cases where a patent application is filed but not followed up often
(not invariably, but often) imply that some additional commercial factor
has entered the equation between filing and early publication, and the
applicant has decided that the solution proposed by the patent will not
be sufficiently strong to make it in the one forum which matters -
commercial markets. It's true that these specifications contain
positive results, but in the sense that they do not provide a full,
technical and commercial solution to the problem, they can equally be
regarded as negative.
This part of the floor discussion seemed to me at the time to be a
compelling case for the use of early published patent applications as
current awareness, to help avoid duplication of research.
-- Stephen Adams Magister Ltd. Crown House, 231 Kings Road, Reading, RG1 4LS, GB Tel: +44 (0)118 929 9515 Fax: +44 (0)118 929 9516 E-mail: stevea@magister.co.uk Website : http://www.magister.co.ukRegistered in England and Wales. Company No. 3407685
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