Appeal 2007-2593
Application 09/859,359
1 The Examiner found that Sloane anticipated claim 1 as shown supra.
2 The Appellants contend that the feature of providing preference information
3 from the wireless device attached to a shopping cart through a pre-established
4 wireless communication means patentably defines the present invention over
5 Sloane (Br. 8:Last full ¶).
6 The Appellants contend that Sloane stores preference information at a
7 centralized rather than local location (Br. 9). The Appellants’ evidence for this is a
8 recitation from Sloane in which purchase histories are maintained on a central
9 location and never received from Sloane’s wireless device The Appellants
10 contend that the only information received from the wireless device is a random
11 number that does not constitute preference information (Br. 10:Top 2 ¶’s).
12 Issue12
13 Thus the issue before us is whether Sloane describes element [2], viz.
14 automatically receiving preference information of the user from the wireless
15 communication device through the wireless communication.
16 Examiner’s Response16
17 The Examiner responded by finding that Sloane describes element [2] by
18 receiving preference information such as current purchases and providing
19 discounts automatically for the items being purchased in conjunction with the
20 retailer computer/controller. The Examiner found that even if the wireless device
21 contacts the retailer computer/controller to receive this information first, it is doing
22 this automatically in that no action is required by the user to physically go to a
23 retailer computer to type in commands to send in the information from the retailer
24 computer to the wireless device (Answer 11:Bottom ¶ - 12:lines 1-2).
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