How can we fix the PTO, allowing examiners to effectively distinguish between patentable and unpatentable inventions, without slowing the process to a crawl or wasting a bunch of money? This essay reviews the recent literature and considers a number of proposals and their problems. It concludes...

How can we allow patent examiners to effectively distinguish between patentable and unpatentable inventions, without slowing the process to a crawl or wasting a bunch of money? This essay reviews the recent literature and considers a number of proposals and their limitations. It concludes that...

In this article, I introduce the interaction between intellectual property (IP) and antitrust law. I describe the ways in which these two important areas of government regulation are and are not in tension, and discuss the history of the relationship between these laws. I argue that IP and...

We have conducted an empirical study of every reported doctrine of equivalents decision in both the Federal Circuit and the district courts during three periods - one before the Federal Circuit's 2000 Festo opinion, one after that opinion but before the Supreme Court's 2002 opinion, and a third...

Patent law is crucial to encourage technological innovation. But as the patent system currently stands, diverse industries from pharmaceuticals to software to semiconductors are all governed by the same rules even though they innovate very differently. The result is a crisis in the patent...

Michele Boldrin and David Levine offer a strong attack on intellectual property (IP), which they call “intellectual monopoly.” In their view, IP is not necessary to encourage invention or creation. Quite the contrary, they argue that we get innovation from competition, not monopoly. Further,...