Article 5 of the Patent Law stipulates that: "Where the disclosure, use or manufacture of an invention or creation violates national law, social morality or jeopardizes the public **** interest, a patent cannot be granted".
In the newly published "New Patent Law Explained", the invention that violates the national law is explained as follows:
"The invention that violates the national law should be understood as an invention whose purpose itself is expressly prohibited by the law of our country, or is contrary to the law of our country.
Since gambling, drug addiction, and forgery of official documents and seals are prohibited by China's criminal law, inventions relating to equipment, machines or tools specially used for gambling, apparatus for drug addicts, and equipment for forgery of national currencies, bills, official documents, certificates, seals, and cultural relics, etc., belong to the category of inventions which are in violation of national laws, and cannot be granted patents. It should be noted that if the purpose of the invention does not violate national law, but the application of the invention in a non-normal way may result in the violation of national law, the invention can not be refused to be granted a patent because the misuse of the invention would violate national law. Examples of such inventions are narcotics, tranquilizers, and stimulants for the purpose of treating diseases, and game machines and chess and cards for the purpose of entertainment."
On this basis, Article 9 of the Rules for the Implementation of the Patent Law provides a further restrictive interpretation of the meaning of "violating national laws" as referred to in Article 5 of the Patent Law. The article stipulates: "The invention-creation referred to in Article 5 of the Patent Law as being in violation of national laws does not include the invention-creation the implementation of which is prohibited by national laws only."
At the same time, Part II, Chapter 1, Section 2.1 of the Examination Guidelines further explains it as follows:
"An invention-creation whose own purpose is contrary to national law cannot be granted a patent. For example, a device, machine or instrument used for gambling.
This is not the case where the purpose of the invention itself is not contrary to the law of the land, but it is contrary to the law of the land because of its misuse. For example. Various poisons, narcotics, tranquilizers, stimulants for medical purposes and chess and cards for recreational purposes, etc."
The case involves a patent application for an invention entitled "Coin Game Machine and Coin Carrying Device".
Claim 1 is as follows:
1. A coin transfer device comprising a coin launching part forming a coin carrier and a coin flattening part, wherein a plurality of coins in a horizontally stacked state can be placed in the said coin carrier, and the said coin launching part can make the horizontally stacked coins move horizontally, and at the same time the said coin flattening part is in contact with the coins while they are moving to make the coins move up and down and make them move up and down and make them move up and down. The horizontally stacked coins are aligned up and down.
The specification of the case describes the background technology and the purpose of the invention as follows:
The present invention relates to a coin launching game machine, and specifically to a coin launching game machine having a coin carrying device for supplying overlappingly placed coins to a game area.
A horizontal game board carries a number of coins, and a coin pusher plate oscillating from side to side is provided in a defined area of the game board, and when a gamer puts coins in his hand into the game board, coins pushed by the coin pusher plate push other coins, and coins fall down from the game board, and the coins that fall down are given to the gamer. With the above game form of coin push out game machine is widely known.
The supply of coins on the game board of the coin pushers is usually supplied by the manager of the game machine before the start of business. In other words, the coins are placed on the game board by hand in advance before the operation of the game machine. There can be various methods of placing the coins, but in most cases the coins are placed evenly over the entire area and in several localized piles. The reason for this placement is that the coins that are pushed by the coin pusher remain essentially in the shape of their initial placement as they move across the game board, which creates a desire in the gamer to obtain more coins by dropping the piles of coins, and enhances the enjoyment of the game.
However, with this method of supplying coins, the manager must periodically check the game machine to see if the appropriate amount of coins are placed on the game board and whether the appropriate number of piles of coins still exists, and because the machine must be stopped and the supply of coins must be carried out at the time of checking, the operating cost of the game machine is increased.
Also, there are automatic coin supplying devices for supplying coins to a game board, and the device described in Techepin 8-215422 is an example of such a coin supplying device. However, such a coin supplying device scatters coins indiscriminately and aimlessly on the game board, so that it is not possible to place a pile of coins having an appropriate amount of coins on the game board.
There is, therefore, a need for a coin-carrying device for automatically supplying a pile of coins to a specific position on a game board (game area) of a coin-push-out game machine, and for a coin-push-out game machine using such a device.
(1) In order to solve the above-described problem, the coin carrying device of the present invention has the following features: a coin carrying device comprising a coin pushing member forming a coin carrier and a coin aligning member, the above-described coin carrier being capable of placing a plurality of coins horizontally stacked in a state of horizontal stacking, the above-described coin pushing member being capable of making the coins horizontally stacked in the state of horizontal stacking to move in a horizontal direction, and at the same time the above-described aligning member being in contact with the coins in movement The horizontal stacked coins are aligned up and down. According to this configuration, a plurality of coins are horizontally stacked in the coin housing body, and the stacked coins are neatly stacked up and down while the stacked coins are moved to a desired position by the coin pushing member.
After substantive examination, the examination opinion given by the examiner in the first notice of examination opinion can be summarized as follows:
The object of the invention of the present application is to provide a device for placing a stack of coins having an appropriate amount of coins on a game board, so as to make the player have a desire to obtain more coins by hoping that the coins falling from the stacks will increase the fun of the game. It can be seen from this that the gaming machine covered by the present application is for the purpose of gambling and is an instrument of gambling, and therefore, in accordance with Article 5 of the Patent Law, the gaming machine covered by the present application violates the provisions of the national laws and is not capable of being granted a patent.
The applicant amended the specification in response to the examination opinion and made the following statements:
Amendment of the specification
1. Deletion of the content in the specification which is prone to misunderstanding of gambling, namely, the content of "stimulating the desire of the player to obtain coins" in lines 25-26 on page 13 of the specification. stimulates the gamer's desire to obtain coins".
2. Explain the reasons why the invention is not a gambling tool:
First of all, in judging whether an invention violates national laws, social morality or jeopardizes the interests of the public, the invention should be judged mainly from the three aspects of the invention: the purpose of the invention, the content of the invention, and the effect of the invention.
In terms of the purpose of the invention, the specification of the present invention states on page 1, lines 28-30, that the purpose of the present invention is to provide "a coin transfer device for automatically supplying a pile of coins to a specific position of a game board (game area) of a coin launching game machine, and a coin launching game machine which utilizes such a device". That is, the present invention aims to provide a coin transfer device for use in a coin-pushing game machine, and according to the explanation of the Xinhua Dictionary, "Gambling is a vice in which property is used as a bet to win or lose", and therefore "gambling" has two characteristics. " has two characteristics, one is making bets with belongings and the other is competing to win or lose. Whereas, in the present invention, which merely provides a coin carrying device for use in a coin game machine, it does not contain any purpose relating to the conduct of gambling, and therefore the subject matter of the present invention is not related to gambling.
Furthermore, in terms of the inventive content of the present invention, the present invention relates primarily to coin-pushout game machines, and specifically to coin-pushout game machines having a coin-carrying device for supplying overlappingly placed coins to a playing area. The coins in the present invention are fundamentally different from coins used for gambling, and cannot be equated with coins, because the coins in the present invention are merely a tool used to stimulate a gamer to continue playing, such as the contents of lines 26-28 on page 12 of the specification (which enables to correspond to the result of a rotation game, to set up horizontally stacked coins at a specific position on the gaming area 51)) or a stack of coins. In this way, for the gamer, a chance to get more coins in a subsequent game is added, increasing the interest in continuing the game. In addition, since the coins are supplied on the playing area itself when the game is restarted, the interest in replaying the game can be increased.) In addition, in the inventive content of the present invention, there is no content of "betting" which is necessary for gambling, and it is only for the purpose of playing a game, and therefore, the content of the present invention has nothing to do with gambling.
Additionally, there is a substantial difference between the present invention and gambling in that the effects of the present invention are to increase the entertainment of the people and not to obtain more money.
Through the above discussion, it can be seen that the present invention is substantially different from gambling in terms of the purpose of the invention, the content of the invention and the effect obtained, and that the present invention is not an instrument of gambling, and therefore may be granted a patent.
The examiner made a refusal decision on the said application on this basis, and the reasons for the refusal are summarized as follows:
The purpose of the invention of the present application is itself contrary to the laws of the country. According to the provisions of Article 5 of the Patent Law. A patent cannot be granted.
1. According to the definition of gambling, the so-called "gambling" means "using property as a bet to win or lose", that is, there are two characteristics, one is to use property as a bet, and the other is to win or lose. This invention because the gamer puts in coins, so have the property for the betting characteristics, and the gamer puts in coins by the equipment randomly generated results to decide to win or lose, therefore, the purpose of this invention is to gamble.