Appeal No. 2003-0813
Application No. 08/771,885
Basically, the examiner is taking Official notice that the use of WAN for
connecting computers was well known at the time of the instant invention and that its
use in place of telephone connections, or other types of connections, would have been
obvious to the skilled artisan. This appears, to us, to be a reasonable position which
appellant was free to challenge. Yet, appellant does not challenge this finding by the
examiner, arguing merely that Kawan chooses to employ a telephone connection rather
than a WAN, but does not address the question of the obviousness of using a WAN.
Merely because Kawan chooses to use a conventional telephone connection is
not a valid reason, in our view, for appellant to contend that it would not have been
obvious to use a WAN, instead, if the skilled artisan wished to achieve the advantages
afforded by a WAN. Appellant also points out the differences between telephone lines
and WAN, e.g., speed, protocol, etc. but does not dispute that the differences would
have been familiar to the skilled artisan at the time of the instant invention.
Appellant does point out that since Kawan wants to preserve the look of a
telephone system, the artisan would not have chosen to use a WAN in Kawan’s
system. We are unpersuaded by this argument. The preservation of the look of a
normal telephone system would not preclude the use of a WAN, since the specific type
of connection would be invisible to a casual observer. Moreover, we note that
appellant’s argument is directly solely to Kawan, even though Ahlin is also applied in
the rejection and, in fact, is the primary reference applied.
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