PriorArt
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Google Patents search gets upgrade, now filled with prior art and European patent goodness
The legal tussles between Apple and Samsung have previously placed a spotlight on stuff like 2001: A Space Odyssey by way of prior art. Now Google's patent search is giving prior art some love as well with the addition of the aptly named "Prior Art Finder" to its patent search tool. Marked by a patently obvious blue button, the new addition serves up relevant prior art results by using key phrases from a patent's text and putting them together in a search query. Besides drawing from Google Patents, the finder displays results from Google Scholar, Google Books and the web's other nooks and crannies. The recent improvement also adds some Euro flavor to Google's patent search by including submissions to the European Patent Office. The addition should work well with an update to Google Translate earlier this year that added parallel patent texts from the aforementioned European agency to allow for translations between English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German and Swedish. As always, folks can check the source link for the full details.
Samsung cites '2001: A Space Odyssey' in Apple case
We always appreciate a good 2001 reference, but we can't say we expected to see one crop up in Samsung's ongoing legal dispute with Apple. As noted by FOSS Patents' Florian Mueller though, that's just what Samsung has done in an opposition brief filed last night, which cites the tablet-like devices pictured above as an example of prior art for Apple's iPad-related design patent. Of course, that's just one small part of Samsung's overall defense, but it is certainly one of the most interesting we've seen so far. Head on past the break for the film clip in question.
