Karl Jonsson’s Weblog

Your Breakfast is Patented

The latest campaign from FreeCulture.org is called Cereal Solidarity and highlights the threat of patent bullies. Apparently, a company called Cereality have applied for a patent on several business methods for selling cereal and are threatening other restaurants with lawsuits.

Cereality has patents pending to give them an exclusive right to six business methods, including “displaying and mixing competitively branded food products” and adding “a third portion of liquid.” If these patents are approved by the U.S. Patent Office, Cereality would have a complete monopoly on cereal bar business–just for being the first to put together the legalese necessary to describe mixing breakfast cereal.