>If not, you can always file an application covering the implementation details of your technology that distinguish it from existing prior art.
He said that he is currently practising his invention in public. Thus he can no longer obtain a patent on said invention, his practice of it would provide prior art except under very limited conditions (which don't coincide with operating a business on the internet).
It is possible that he could obtain a granted patent but if any competitor knew that he had already being practising the patent they would know that they were immune from it and it would be effectively impotent to enforce a monopoly position.
As an aside: in the US applicants are required (or were a few years ago, I guess it could have changed) to disclose any close prior art they are aware of in their application. You can also make observations against the grant of said patent but I can't quote the USC without looking it up.
I doubt that by "running an online service" he's disclosed sufficient details to allow somebody to reproduce his invention. Can you tell how PageRank works just by using google?
>I doubt that by "running an online service" he's disclosed sufficient details to allow somebody to reproduce his invention.
If someone looking at the service can tell that it is nearly coincident with their own service then I think there is unlikely to be sufficient inventive step that is undisclosed.
AFAICT that is not how things are measured though, use in public except at specific trade fairs is prior use that voids a patent.
I didn't gather from the original post that the online service was biotech-related. But if it is, then you could be right about the public disclosure (unless the service could be demonstrated as "experimental").
But I think it's more likely that we're talking about a software invention, in which case any non-disclosed implementation details could be a way to avoid potential infringement.
If someone looking at the service can tell that it is nearly coincident with their own service...
Plenty of inventions produce similar results yet have vastly different (and therefore individually patentable) implementations. In the case of an online service, there's little chance of the actual implementation being disclosed or somehow transferred to the end-user. My guess is that the inventive part of the service is executed server-side, and thus isn't accessible to the general public.
He said that he is currently practising his invention in public. Thus he can no longer obtain a patent on said invention, his practice of it would provide prior art except under very limited conditions (which don't coincide with operating a business on the internet).
It is possible that he could obtain a granted patent but if any competitor knew that he had already being practising the patent they would know that they were immune from it and it would be effectively impotent to enforce a monopoly position.
As an aside: in the US applicants are required (or were a few years ago, I guess it could have changed) to disclose any close prior art they are aware of in their application. You can also make observations against the grant of said patent but I can't quote the USC without looking it up.
OMG - just looked it up, http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/documents/1100_113..., USPTO actually charge you to give them prior art against an application. They charge you to make the examiners job easier ...?!?