Appeal No. 2000-0588 Page 11
Application No. 08/824,110
generate a second trigger signal to cause the audio message and/or image to be
displayed. Nakajima discloses a switch arrangement comprising struts 40 mounted in
the cradle 75 of the main body of a toy telephone which serve as a switch to detect
when the headset 12 has been removed from the cradle. When the struts 40 are
released, signaling removal of the headset from the cradle (the action to simulate
answering the call), the bell 35 stops ringing and a message is played. To incorporate
a switch arrangement of the type taught by Nakajima in Wingate’s toy telephone to
sense when the handset 18 has been removed from the main body to answer the “call”
signaled by the telephone ringing to stop the ringing and to generate a trigger signal to
cause the message to be read from memory and played on the small speaker 30 of the
handset 18 in order to simulate answering of the “call” as disclosed by Wingate in
column 1, lines 42-46, would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the
time of appellants’ invention.
We note that appellants have not contested the combination of Wingate and
Nakajima proposed by the examiner. Rather, appellants’ only argument (brief, page 18)
is that Nakajima does not teach a switch which is “coupled to the handset” as called for
in claim 12. We disagree. The language “coupled to the handset” in claim 12 does not
require that the switch be mounted on the handset, as appellants’ argument seems to
imply. The term “couple” is customarily understood to mean “to join together by
fastening or by association” (Webster's New World Dictionary, Third College Edition
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