one-year rule
- A former requirement mandating the filing of a patent application within a year of the invention's public use, sale, offer for sale, or public description by the inventor, failure of which resulted in the invention entering the public domain, ineligible for a patent
- Before 2013, if inventors broke the one-year rule, their inventions would become public domain.
- The one-year rule was commonly known as the on-sale bar when applied to sales.
- Post-2013 changes to patent laws significantly altered the scope of the original one-year rule.
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