Appeal 2006-2109
Application 10/680,678
1 show, a price is not necessarily the amount of funds transacted, and, in fact, the
2 price of the meal vended is not the amount transacted in both cases. Nonfunctional
3 descriptive material will not define the invention over the prior art (See Ngai,
4 supra). Further, although the transfer of funds is clearly functional, the destination
5 of the funds transfer as being directed towards charity is a field of use limitation,
6 and this claim limitation could be met by any transfer of funds to some different
7 entity.
8 We next note that claim 11 is broader in scope than claim 1, and that, as a
9 system claim, the claimed system must only be capable of performing the steps
10 indicated in the claim. Claim 11 does not positively recite actually performing the
11 recited steps.
12 The Appellant first contends that Helbling does not teach or suggest full- or
13 reduced-portion meal products. This raises the question of what a full- or reduced-
14 portion meal is. The Specification indicates that a reduced-portion meal product
15 comprises the same elements as its corresponding full-portion meal product, but in
16 reduced quantities (FF 01). However, there is no indication that this is meant to be
17 a definitive statement. It is therefore ambiguous as to whether this statement refers
18 to a lexicographic definition, or merely to an exemplary embodiment. Although an
19 applicant is entitled to be his own lexicographer, the applicant must do so by
20 placing such definitions in the Specification with sufficient clarity to provide a
21 person of ordinary skill in the art with clear and precise notice of the meaning that
22 is to be construed. (See Paulsen, supra). A statement at the end of the
23 Specification clarifies that the earlier statement regarding a reduced-portion meal
24 pertains to an embodiment only (FF 02). Thus, a full-portion and reduced-portion
15
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