DETAILED ACTION
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1-3, 9-10, 12, 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Bass et al. (US 7,458,488).
Regarding claim 1, Bass discloses a lanyard assembly for retractably and compressively gripping an object, the lanyard assembly comprising: a housing 130 having a chamber and an aperture (Figure 2A); a tether 110 extending from the chamber through the aperture; and a retractor 145 disposed in the housing, the retractor attached to the tether and exerts a tensile force on the tether (col. 6 lines 4-15), wherein the tether includes a first end attached to the retractor (Figure 2B) and an end portion 120 forming a loop having a variable size (Figure 1) configured to be reduced by the tensile force of the retractor on the tether, and the loop is configured to grip the object within the loop. The initial statement of intended use and all other functional implications have been carefully considered but are deemed not to impose any patentably distinguishing structure over that disclosed by Bass which is capable of being used in the intended manner, i.e., to compressively grip and hold an object (see M.P.E.P. 2111). No specific amount of force is claimed and an object such a pen (a tool to the degree claimed) is capable of being held/gripped as claimed.
Regarding claims 2, 3, 9-10, 12, 13, these claims recite functional language regarding the use of the device but do not impart any additional structure to the claims over that which is already recited in claim 1. Tether 110 is configured with the retractor 145 to form an adjustable loop that can be expanded and reduced, the biasing member 155 would urging the loop to reduce in size and grip an object as claimed – see col. 6 lines 4-15.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-8, 11, 14, and 15 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
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/COREY N SKURDAL/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3734
