Ex Parte Poikselka

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 22, 2014

10880982 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 22, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte MIIKKA POIKSELKA
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Appeal 2012-002660
Application 10/880,982
Technology Center 2400
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Before MURRIEL E. CRAWFORD, ANTON W. FETTING, and
BIBHU R. MOHANTY, Administrative Patent Judges.

CRAWFORD, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner’s
final decision rejecting claims 1–29. We have jurisdiction over the appeal
under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.
Claim 1 is illustrative:
1. A method, comprising:
receiving, by a processor, a communication group
definition that is used for creation of a new communication
group in a group communication service, wherein the
communication group definition is provided with a group
advertisement parameter indicating whether the new
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communication group is to be advertised to at least one member
of the newly-created communication group;
determining whether the group advertisement parameter
indicates that the new communication group is to be advertised
to the at least one member of the new communication group;
and
determining to send an advertisement of the new
communication group from the group communication service to
the at least one member of the new communication group based
on the determination, wherein the advertisement informs the at
least one member that the at least one member has been
included in the new communication group.

The Examiner relies on the following prior art references as evidence
of unpatentability:
Bennett US 2001/0032137 A1 Oct. 18, 2001
Winchell US 2002/0151321 A1 Oct. 17, 2002
Toyryla US 2003/0083086 A1 May 1, 2003

P. Koskelainen et al., An Extensible Markup Language (XML)
Configuration Access Protocol (XCAP) Usage for Conference
Policy Manipulation, Internet Engineering Task Force
1–39 (June 20, 2003) (Internet-Draft) (http://tools.ieft.org/html/draft-
koskelainen-xcon-xcap-cpcp-usage-00) (last visited July 18, 2008)
(hereinafter “Koskelainen”).

J. Rosenberg, Extensible Markup Language (XML) Configuration
Access Protocol (XCAP) Usages for Setting Presence Authorization,
Internet Engineering Task Force 1–24 (Oct. 27, 2003) (Internet-Draft)
(http://tools.ieft.org/id/draft-ietf-simple-xcap-auth-usage-01.txt) (last
visited Feb. 7, 2009) (hereinafter “Rosenberg”).

Appellant appeals the following rejections:
1. Claims 1, 2, 6–8, 13, 17, 21, and 25–26 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Winchell and Bennett.
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2. Claims 3, 9, 18, and 27 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Winchell, Bennett, and Rosenberg.
3. Claims 4, 5, 10, 11, 19, 20, 28, and 29 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Winchell, Bennett, Rosenberg, and Koskelainen.
4. Claims 12, 14–16, and 22–24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable
over Winchell, Bennett, and Toyryla.

ISSUE
Did the Examiner err in rejecting the claims because Winchell does
not disclose a communication group with a communication group definition
with a group advertisement parameter?

ANALYSIS
The Appellant argues that Winchell does not disclose a
communication group definition with a group advertisement parameter.
We find that Appellant’s Specification discloses that a user sets a
group advertisement parameter when the group is created. The group
advertisement parameter can have different statuses such as active or
inactive or active/inactive/selected users (para. 32). If the group
advertisement parameter is set to active, the server starts advertising the
communication group to all group members or to a selected subset of group
members (id.).
The Examiner directs our attention to paragraphs 34, 41, and 44 of
Winchell for teaching the creation of a communication group with an
advertisement profile stating that the message characteristics 66 and the
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delivery characteristics 64 are considered group advertisement parameters
(Ans. 6).
We agree with the Appellant that Winchell does not disclose creating
a communication group definition that includes an advertisement parameter.
First, the message characteristics 66 and the delivery characteristics 68 relate
to the message being sent rather than the group sending the message. In
addition, the message characteristics 66, as defined by Winchell, relates to
data that defines, classifies, and characterizes the informational message and
does not relate to whether the group is advertised to at least one member of
the group as required by claim 1 (para. 41). Similarly, the delivery
characteristics 64 relate to relates to when to deliver a message and what
message to deliver not whether the group is advertised to at least one
member of the group.
In view of the foregoing, we will not sustain the Examiner’s rejection
of claim 1 and claim 2 dependent therefrom. We will also not sustain the
Examiner’s rejections of the remaining claims because each of these claims
requires a communication group advertisement parameter that indicates
whether the group is to be advertised to at least one member of the group
and each of the rejections relies on Winchell for teaching this subject matter.

DECISION
The decision of the Examiner is reversed.

REVERSED

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Application 10/880,982

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