The Prior art reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Jul-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Prior art

Prior art is all information that has been disclosed to the public in any form before a given date. This term is mainly used in the patent field. Patent Offices are specialised organisations dealing with prior art searches in the context of the patent granting procedure. To assess the validity of a patent application, Patent Offices explore the prior art that was disclosed before the patent filing date.

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