Appeal No. 2003-0663
Application No. 09/072,549
signals (abstract, line 5-signaling signals), an unshielded
twisted pair of wires (telephone wire) defining a UTP
communication path (column 20, lines 20+)1 arranged for video-
signal transportation, wherein the system is configured to
multiplex analog video signals with digital controls (lines 19-
27)2 and to transmit the multiplexed signals along the UTP
communication path, etc.
The examiner indicates that Verhoeckx does not teach the UTP
wire being included as part of a computer network, but that
Verhoeckx does teach using the existing UTP wire of a telephone
network. The examiner then contends that the claimed “computer
network” is a “merely nominal recitation” and that there is no
“functional relationship tying the elements of the claims to the
‘computer network’” (answer-page 5). The examiner concludes that
the recited elements would function exactly the same way over a
UTP path separate from that of a “computer network” and that
integrating the video UTP with an existing UTP computer network
path would have been “a matter of economic” (answer-page 5) and
1We note that while the examiner refers to column “20,” the
reference has only 12 columns.
2 We note that the examiner refers to lines “19-27" but does
not identify any particular column of the reference.
-8–
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