The Seven Year Itch

Today (May 16, 2012) marks the seventh anniversary of my switch to patent law from academia. This ability to remember these little anniversaries--arguably a predominatly 'girly' thing--is something that I am rather fond of, because it doesn't need any extra effort to remember these dates, but you still get a chance to bathe in nostalgia. If the word 'itch' in the title is clashing with your mental imagery of the soothing foam bath of nostalgia, worry not. The 'itch' was caused by the need for web-mortalizing the seven-year journey in some form, and with each letter being typed here, the 'itch' is actually diminishing. So may be a better title for this blog is "The seven year(s after the sw)itch," but let's not get carried away too much.
The most frequently asked question that I answer when I talk to someone who used to know me as an engineer-gearing-up-for-academia is "Why did you make the transition into patent law?" Coincidentally, even today I had the same conversation with a junior from the University of Maryland. The answer seems simple now. It was the pregnancy. Contrary to the myth that pregnancy may cause 'brain fog,' it actually made me see very clearly what I wanted to do with my engineering degree while capitalizing on my analytical skills and love of writing. It probably helped that an old friend happened to pay a social visit at the right time when I was naturally in an introspective phase, thanks to being first-time-pregnant. During a casual conversation, our friend revealed how he made the transition from academia to patent law. At that time I didn't pay enough attention, but a few weeks later it started to make a lot of sense, as I wanted to stay in the DC Metro area, where the patent law ecosystem is enviable (It is a different story that now I am in the silicon valley, and loving it here). Fortunately, landing the first legal job as a technical advisor in an intellectual property boutique firm was quite painless, and after that, it was just a matter of learning to be progressively comfortable with the law firm culture.
Seven years later, I can confidently state that even the hardcore engineers devoted to bench work should never underestimate the flickers of 'love-like-feelings' if they recognize those accidentally during a 'desk assignment'. I now know that those afternoons of being immersed in multiphysics modeling in between lab experiments during my post-doctoral stint was the prelude to my career in patent law.
Looking forward to many more seven years!

Of Cities, Street Arts, Copyrights, and Patents

There is something about the big cities. I love my suburban life-- the glorious bloom of red roses in my Sunnyvale garden, the manicured landscape around my Palo Alto office. But the mid-week visits to San Francisco on two consecutive days (to attend a conference) stoked some lazy areas of my brain in a very unique way that my daily pretty suburban routine couldn't do for quite some time now. I started writing this blog in mid February. But the gestation period was getting unpredictably long. The blog baby was not quite ready to come out. The blogger mom was letting the baby stay in indefinitely out of sheer laziness. The vibrant graffitis of San Francisco acted as the Pitocin that finally induced my labor. So here it is...my blog about the strange bedfellows--street arts and intellectual property.

I have encountered the world of street art in various different contexts in the last few months.

First, there was this very innovatively named documentary,"Exit through the gift shop," (ETTGS) that my husband recommended so vigorously, that I had to watch it--and I am so glad I did. This was in early February, i.e. before Justin Timberlake introduced himself as "I'm Banksy!" at the Oscars. I had no idea that ETTGS was nominated for the Oscars in the best documentary category, so it was a really pleasant surprise, and I love Justin Timberlake for thinking outside the Chirlie Sheen box for a comic touch. ETTGS is directed by the enigmatic British street artist Banksy, and it is about---you guessed it--street artists. The documentary explores the intriguing and complex love-hate relationship between street art and mainstream fame. The part that triggered a huge bout of nostalgia for me was when it showed the walls in Washington DC famously adorned by the modern legend of graffiti, the Borf. I used to pass by those walls everyday during my commute to DC till 2008. There is also a documentary called "Borf!", which is now on my ever-growing must-watch list.

One of the street artists that ETTGS featured is Shepherd Fairey. I didn't remember the name Shephed Fairey the first time I heard it. But, like many, I vividly remember the portrait that brought Shepherd to limelight. It was the famous "Hope" illustration, where Shepherd allegedly used a copyrighted photograph of the then-yet-to-be-President Obama. So I could associate the name with the controversial copyright infringement case that I have read about in recent past where the Associated Press and Fairey announced settlement in the Obama poster case. The coincidental convergence of entertainment and professional domains is always quite exhilarating!

I work in intellectual property law. It is probably not as appealing as criminal law or family law for the masses. I was very excited when seasoned TV producer David E. Kelley decided to create a show ("Harry's Law") about a patent lawyer. But to my utter frustration, from the very first episode in January, 2011, the premise of the show changed to criminal law to reach out to a greater audience. I wish someone in David Kelley's legal advisors' team reminded him that you don't always have to show graffiti in a negative way as the backdrop of a crime scene (typically an alley where someone gets mugged and/or killed). Tons of patent applications are filed in the online gaming industry, where the patent filers aim to protect their products (e.g., a gaming controller shaped like a bottle of spray can and equipped with sophisticated tactile feedback mechanisms emulating the experience of creation of a graffiti with a spray can on a wall) that recreate the adrenaline rush that is part of a real-life street artist.

And then there is comic book art, which is not exactly graffiti, but is kind of closely related in terms of art form. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) publishes a list of cool engineering jobs every year to reassure the engineers that their profession can be fun too. In this year's list, there was the profile of Hsin-Chien Huang, who is tantalizingly called the "Pixel Provocateur"! He started his career in engineering, but is now one of Taiwan's best-known multimedia artists. His gallery is simply mesmerizing. The IEEE article says, "Hsin-Chien Huang grew up daydreaming about becoming a comic book artist. He invented his own comic strips and doodled imaginary spaceships and military bases."

I will end this blog daydreaming about street art in three-dimension, i.e. street sculptures, possibly using recyclable containers. My son's Green Science robot toys and the fresh perspectives from the Green Tech conference in San Francisco are nicely getting mixed in my inspiration soup! Now that the GPS chip-makers have almost solved the 'urban canyon' signal-loss problem by inventing (and yes, patenting) smart algorithms, driving around in the streets of San Francisco while looking for street art may be fun! Concerned about the carbon footprint of that 'fun' activity, where you have to watch out for the occasional rollerbladers (may be some of them are street artists) appearing in front of your car out of nowhere, crossing the roads at arbitrary points, totally ignoring the crosswalks? But who's calculating! Or, may be there is a way to calculate the carbon footprint of recreational city driving. May be there is a mobile app for that!

Full Circle in the Valley

Blackberry is addictive. No question. Even a non-workaholic like me check my message first thing after I open my eyes every morning even before I get out of the bed. It has become a reflex action.

Mine is an East coast law firm with big and small offices in the West Coast. By the time I get up at the Pacific coast, my inbox is already populated with a daily dose of professional newsletters, routine conflict check emails, and lately, with motivational messages from the managing partners from the East coast offices narrating recent success stories of engaging new clients and new businesses. This morning was no exception.

The firm CEO sent an excited message about engaging new business from a tech client, GigOptix, “a leading provider of electronic engines for the optically connected digital world.” This is a photonics communications company. Once you switch to patent law, it becomes a professional necessity to dilute your subject matter expertise in order to cover the breadth of technologies that come your way. Still, being a Ph.D. engineer who wrote a thesis on photonic devices, I got very curious to explore the extent of our firm’s engagement in GigOptix matters. Are we going to do their patent work? Am I going to be part of the GigOptix team at my firm?

I went to GigOptix’s website to refresh my memory regarding their technology and to know more about the key people running the company. The CEO, Dr. Avi Katz’s name rings a rather loud bell. Where have I heard his name before?

A search in the nooks and crannies of my brain for information stored long ago takes a few seconds. Oh, I remember now. I studied one of his patents on gold-tin eutectic solders when I was working as a first year graduate research assistant at the University of Maryland, back in 1997! The patent was granted in 1993 on an invention that Dr. Katz came up with while he worked at AT&T Bell Labs in New Jersey. (I later read in his bio at the GigOptix website that he has more than 70 patents!)

Back in 1997, I had no inkling that I would end up being a patent law professional myself. I had groomed myself to be an academic researcher. But patent law appealed more as a career during some introspective moments while I was pregnant, and I joined a boutique intellectual property law firm in Washington DC in 2005.

Strangely, even at my first job in patent law, I had these “full circle” happenstances. I applied to my DC patent law firm, as I knew their name through the University of Maryland’s Technology Transfer office, who handled the patent application on my graduate work on electronic packaging (along with my Ph.D. advisor and another researcher). Coincidentally, my first boss at the DC law firm was the same patent attorney who wrote and successfully prosecuted my patent application into an issued patent. I talked to him over the phone as an inventor in 1999, six years before I became his colleague.

In late summer 2008, we moved to the silicon valley as my husband joined Google. (Since we are on the topic of coincidences, it won’t be completely irrelevant if I mention that I wrote patent applications for Google at my DC firm even before my husband joined the company.) I joined the Palo Alto office of my current law firm in September, 2008. In November, 2008, a big group of lateral attorneys from a now-defunct law firm joined our firm. It didn’t take long to find another coincidence. Apparently, my current next-door neighbor, who came with the big group as a lateral Partner, knows my second boss at my DC firm very well. They had adjoining offices at the Patent Office when they were both US Patent Office Examiners!

Coming back to Dr. Katz and GigOptix, I am thrilled at the possibility of working with someone who inspired me when I was a young researcher more than a decade ago. Silicon valley is full of these people, who started as hard-core researchers, and then took on greater/more diverse roles in technology companies. The valley makes me feel everyday that I have landed in the right place. This is where you and your friend talk about “copyleft” while shopping for school supplies at Target. And it does not hurt, when Meg Whitman (ex-eBay CEO) says at a conference, “You look familiar”! I am sure Meg mistook me for someone else, but I got my anecdote alright.

For a techie, the circle is not completed until you come to the valley.