1. Claim Interpretation I Patent Law 3.30.04

2. United States Patent RE33,054 Markham September 12, 1989 Inventory control and reporting system for drycleaning stores Abstract An inventory control and reporting system especially for retail drycleaners includes a data input keyboard having key blocks corresponding to information for identification and calculation of processing costs of laundry articles to be cleaned, a data processor adapted to calculate pricing information and to generate reports based upon such data input, the processor being connected to a printer and the processor and printer producing sequential multiple part bar code records and tags for attachment to the laundry articles in sequential transactions, and also as hard copies for the customer and for the establishment.

5. Justice Benjamin Curtis

6. Today’s Shameless Digression: Dred Scott

7. Markman Highlights Historical approach to 7 th Amendment Cases –“mongrel practice” – proceed by analogy –p. 888 Deep roots of patent proceedings in 17 th -19 th centuries Repeated insistence that “legal construction is

8. “functional considerations” - 894 Institutional competency –The Federal Circuit revolution comes home to roost! –Uniformity is important Statutory objectives

9. Holding “Interpretation... Is an issue for the judge...” p. 896

10. What Hath Markman Wrought? Crucial importance of the “Markman Hearing” –Claim interpretation 1 st ; frames entire case Judges are reversed at least as often as juries on claim construction!

11. Christian Chu Reversal rate in patent cases on all issues hovered around 47.3%, and dropped to 36.3% if summary affirmances were included. The Federal Circuit changed at least one claim interpretation in 44% of its writing opinions Modified claim interpretation resulted in reversals of 68% of those opinions.

12. Christian Chu, Empirical Analysis of Federal Circuit's Claim Construction Trends, 16 Berkeley Tech. L.J. 1075 (2001)

13. Kimberley Moore District court judges improperly construed patent claim terms in 33% of the cases appealed to the Federal Circuit. This rate was higher than the reversal rate on other patent issues.

14. Kimberly A. Moore, Are District Court Judges Equipped to Resolve Patent Cases?, 15 Harv. J. Law & Tec 1 (Fall, 2001). Gretchen Ann Bender, Uncertainty and Unpredictability in Patent Litigation: The Time is Ripe for a Consistent Claim Construction Methodology, 8 J. Intell. Prop. L. 175 (2001)