Appeal 2007-1780
Application 10/340,127
The Examiner disagrees. The Examiner notes that both Grasso and
Schwab deal with earphones. The Examiner contends that it would have
been obvious to an artisan to use the wireless communication of Schwab
with the earphones of Grasso to allow the user more mobility, such as being
able to walk away from the player momentarily, or the ability to use their
hands freely without getting tangled in cords (Answer 8).
After carefully considering all of the evidence before us, we find
Appellants’ argument that the size of the earphones does not provide
motivation for the combination to be unavailing because the Examiner does
not rely upon Schwab for the purpose of modifying Grasso with larger
earphones. The Examiner merely looks to the Schwab secondary reference
for its teaching of wireless communications associated with earphones (See
Answer 6). Our reviewing court has stated: “[t]he use of patents as
references is not limited to what the patentees describe as their own
inventions or to the problems with which they are concerned. They are part
of the literature of the art, relevant for all they contain.” In re Heck, 699
F.2d 1331, 1333 (Fed. Cir. 1983) (quoting In re Lemelson, 397 F.2d 1006,
1009 (CCPA 1968)).
Here, given that pluggable earphones and wireless communications
are notoriously well known in the art, as evidenced by Grasso and Schwab,
we find the Examiner’s proffered combination reasonably teaches and/or
suggests Appellants’ claimed invention in terms of familiar elements that
would have been combined by an artisan having common sense using known
methods to achieve a predictable result at the time of the invention. See
KSR, 127 S. Ct. at 1739-40. Therefore, we conclude the Examiner has
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