Novelty Vs. Utility
Unlike novelty, a court will not assume that an item has utility. A utility does not need to be obvious to the user. A patented item can be shown to have utility independent of patents granted for other inventions. An application for a previously patented invention that included a use the applicant had not previously contemplated has been rejected because it was not novel.
Read more about this topic: Utility (patent)
Famous quotes containing the words novelty and/or utility:
“As for Clothing, to come at once to the practical part of the question, perhaps we are led oftener by the love of novelty and a regard for the opinions of men, in procuring it, than by a true utility.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Moral sensibilities are nowadays at such cross-purposes that to one man a morality is proved by its utility, while to another its utility refutes it.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)