I think that these are important concepts that should be included in any section concerning patent infringement - I was thinking, in fact, that this should be broken out into separate templates on the three major areas of IP law, since each has many important concepts. BDAbramson T 20:34, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your message. I am not denying the significance of these concepts. Not at all. But...

"Prosecution history estoppel" is a United States-specific patent law concept and in my opinion it would make the general IP template slightly U.S. centric, i.e. not totally neutral.

"Doctrine of equivalents" is an important concept, but, as you have pointed out, what about Claim, Exhaustion of rights, First to file, First to invent, Industrial applicability, Inventive step and nonobviousness, Inventorship, Novelty, Patentable subject matter, Person having ordinary skill in the art, Prior art, Priority right, Reduction to practice, Research exemption, Term of patent, Transfer (patent), Unity of invention, Utility, Business method patent, Patent application, Software patent, European Patent Organisation, United States Patent and Trademark Office, World Intellectual Property Organization, TRIPs Agreement, Community Patent, European patent law and so on (see also See also section of patent)?

We definitely need a clear criterion for inclusion in this template. The criterion should not be complied with by too many articles, otherwise the template will become useless. I would tend to be minimalist. Specific templates should be written: {{Template:patent law}}, {{Template:European patent law}} (I just created this one), {{Template:United States patent law}}, ... I entirely concur with your idea of breaking out topics in specific templates. --Edcolins 21:39, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Bryan, you are our man! Thanks for the hidden note in the template. --Edcolins 21:48, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Should we, perhaps, have a general Template:Patent law to cover general topics and go into all patent articles, and separate Template:European patent law and Template:United States patent law which would go into articles on those subjects, in addition to the general template? I note that we have a Template:Patentability. BDAbramson T 21:49, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I wonder if there are other topics that have multiple infobox-type templates? I would worry that the page would get too busy. perhaps? Bryan 21:53, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

IMHO, the general Template:Patent law should cover general topics but should not go into all patent articles. Category:Patent law is the place to find all articles on the subject. A template on the contrary should be minimalist. Btw, there is also Template:European Patent Organisation. --Edcolins 22:01, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I bow to your superior involvement in patent-related articles - but I do think a template spices up an otherwise graphic-free page. BDAbramson T 22:23, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

My paper encyclopedia does not contain an image for each and every article. I do think a well-written article does not need more than the matter making it. I beg you not to add templates for all patent articles. They can be fairly disruptive. --Edcolins 22:33, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Fret not, I was just making an observation, not a declaration of intent. I will say, however, that I favor the liberal dispensation of images and templates precisely because Wikipidia is not a paper encyclopedia. BDAbramson T 22:43, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I saw the addition of the IP template to prosecution history estoppel and I was going to change it, but I didn't have the time (fighting in biopiracy). And, I do believe we've been down this road with the patent law template before. It's mighty difficult to distill what exactly ought to belong on it because of the significant variation among jurisdictions. Perhaps, we should add a link like More patent law topics... or something of the sort to the patent law topic. mmmbeer^{T / C / ?} 23:10, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

So what's the consensus here? Should we go with a general IP template, or develop separate templates for patents, copyright, etc.? When I dug up the (nascent) IP template this morning and expanded it, I was thinking of the needs of someone who really doesn't know very much about IP and could benefit from an accessible list of pertinent articles. I can see the argument for separate templates - or maybe a conjoined one; patent articles might have a patent section first and then general IP links? Oh god whatta lotta work. (I'm still in a state of shock from trying to insert a U.S. Supreme Court template into a SCOTUS decision Feist Publications v. Rural Telephone Service) Bryan 23:24, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

• I don't think anyone disagrees that we should have more specialized templates for the three areas of IP. We can basically cut this one into three pieces for starters, but we should generally agree what will go into the individual IP templates before we do that. BDAbramson T 01:40, 15 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • I took a stab at the patent law template: Template:Patent law. I can't think of any "higher" level to approach the patent law: 1) getting a patent, 2) elements of a patent, 3) infringement, and 4) capitalizing upon it. I'm just putting it out there. mmmbeer^{T / C / ?} 20:16, 15 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Should be, I think, to provide a list of general (top-level) topics that an interested newcomer can explore. We really have to resist the temptation to put tons of links in this thing, or it won't be useful to people.Bryan 21:53, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

• That largely depends how it's laid out, I think. I've made some fairly monstrous templates for Template:TortLaw, Template:PropertyLaw, Template:CrimLaw, among others. I have done so because my experience as a law student leads me to believe that laying out the breadth of a subject in a template organized like an outline is likely to best serve the community of interest for those templates. BDAbramson T 22:22, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think the CrimLaw template is overly monstrous - it's exactly what I had in mind! I like the way you centered the article links -- this allows more material to be inserted while still remaining visible.Bryan 23:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

What about adding domain name to the template? Are domain names widely considered as a form of intellectual property?--Edcolins 21:07, 3 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would have expected the first category to be "Copyright ... and Related Rights" with Moral Rights being a subcategory (together with Performers Rights and, perhaps, Database Rights).

I'm reluctant to make such a change without consultation though as it may be too Euro-centric. Any feelings? Tim B 12:42, 8 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]