Appeal No. 2003-1317
Application 09/043,787
that Acres was cited to teach the obviousness of a mystery
jackpot. The examiner notes that the disclosure of Weiss would
have suggested to the artisan that the amount of money played
could be determined by monitoring either hardmeters or
softmeters. Finally, the examiner responds that the mystery
jackpot in Acres is awarded to a particular machine independent
of the gaming result of that machine [answer, pages 3-10].
We will sustain the examiner’s rejection of claims 46-53
for essentially the reasons argued by the examiner in the answer.
For the most part, the examiner’s responses to appellants’
arguments provide a convincing rebuttal to appellants’ arguments.
With respect to the hardmeter arguments, we find that even though
the prior art references may not specify that hardmeter signals
are used, we agree with the examiner that it would have been
obvious to the artisan to use hardmeter signals. For purposes of
awarding a mystery jackpot in Weiss as taught by Acres, it is
necessary to transmit signals regarding the amount of money
played. Since the amount of money played is known to be stored
in the hardmeters, it would have been obvious to the artisan to
use this known source of money played signals for determining
when the mystery jackpot should be awarded.
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