[Hyena]

These stories always make me wonder about the people who work at the patent office. What are they like? What do they think? Are they mostly young people, old people, tech people, clerical people, Wisconsinites, suburbanites, Mad Men or Squidbillies? What do they know? What were they told? Where do they sit? Do they surf the Internet all day?

A lot of patents that get approved are seemingly obvious but clearly, to someone, it wasn't. And that makes me wonder what their life and interests and milieu is like. I suspect that until we're asking that question, the patent system will continue to suck.