1959-1900

IPPT19540308, USSC, Mazer v Stein
Statuettes copyrightable. Idea-expression dichotomy: Unlike a patent, a copyright gives no exclusive right to the art disclosed; protection is given only to the expression of the idea - not the idea itself.Utilitarian-nonutilitarian dichotomy: Regulation 202.8, supra, makes clear that artistic articles are protected in "form but not their mechanical or utilitarian aspects."

IPPT19500529, USSC, Graver Tank v Linde Air
Doctrine of equivalence: To prohibit no other would place the inventor at the mercy of verbalism, and would be subordinating substance to form. Equivalence is not the prisoner of a formula and an absolute to be considered in a vacuum. Triple identity test: function-way-result: a patentee may invoke this doctrine to proceed against the producer of a device "if it performs substantially the same function in substantially the same way to obtain the same result. Insubstantial difference; changes which avoid infringement are colorable only

IPPT19480216, USSC, Funk v Kalo
Unpatentable qualities that are the work of nature. The qualities of these bacteria, like the heat of the sun, electricity, or the qualities of metals, are part of the storehouse of knowledge of all men. They are manifestations of laws of nature, free to all men and reserved exclusively to none. He who discovers a hitherto unknown phenomenon of nature has no claim to a monopoly of it which the law recognizes. If there is to be invention from such a discovery, it must come from the application of the law of nature to a new and useful end. Discovery of the fact that certain strains of each species of these bacteria can be mixed without harmful effect to the properties of either is a discovery of their qualities of non-inhibition. It is no more than the discovery of some of the handiwork of nature and hence is not patentable.

IPPT19181223, USSC, International News Service v Associated Press

Misappropriation of news for commercial use: Defendant […] is taking material that has been acquired by complainant as the result of organiza-tion and the expenditure of labor, skill, and money, and which is salable by complainant for money, and that defendant in appropriating it and selling it as its own is endeavoring to reap where it has not sown, and by disposing of it to newspapers that are competitors of complainant's members is appropri-ating to itself the harvest of those who have sown.

IPPT1913, UKHL, Gillette Safety Razor v Anglo-American Trading

Gillette defence of applying the prior art: secure if he knows that that which he is doing differs from that which has been done of old only in non-patentable variations, such as the substitution of mechanical equivalents or changes of material, shape, or size. The defence that 'the alleged in-fringement was not novel at the date of the plaintiff's letters patent,' is a good defence in law, and it would sometimes obviate the great length and expense of patent cases if the defendant could and would put forth his case in this form, and thus spare himself the trouble of demonstrating on which horn of the well-known dilemma the plaintiff had impaled himself, invalidity or noninfringement