This morning I stumbled onto a new site: FreshPatents.com. The goal of the site appears to be providing a database of published patent applications. The site even sets up RSS feeds by USPTO Class (you can set an RSS feed by technology, for instance getting abstracts to all published patent applications relating to USPTO Class 482: “exercise equipment”). If you use a program like NewsGator (or one of the other RSS aggregators), you could have this information automatically pulled into MS Outlook as (what looks like) e-mails.
While the goal of the patent system is the distribution of knowledge (in exchange for a limited monopoly), do not forget that reviewing such information comes with a risk, namely liability for treble damages. How? If your company regularly uses a service like this (or does regular patent searches for what your competitors are patenting) it is pretty hard to argue that you didn’t have notice that your competitor had a patent. If your company is on notice (even if that “notice” is just one of your engineers surfing the Internet or aggregating RSS feeds which he doesn’t thoroughly read), you could pay dearly if you lose an infringement case.
I suppose that this also means that when doing electronic discovery you need to check what RSS feeds/blogs your opponent’s employees are reading…
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