Obviousness

Obviousness Analysis of US Patent 11,338,189 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

This analysis identifies combinations of prior art references that would render the independent claims of US Patent 11,338,189 obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA) at the time of the invention.

The core of US Patent 11,338,189 lies in enabling users to participate simultaneously in multiple distinct contests of skill or chance based on a single performance (i.e., a single set of event selections or inputs), with results and separate standings being maintained and transmitted for each of these multiple contests.

Primary Prior Art Reference

• U.S. Pat. No. 5,813,913 to Berner and Lockton (the '913 patent): This patent is explicitly discussed in the background of US11338189 and serves as a foundational piece of prior art.

  The '913 patent discloses a "central computing system which includes a means of grouping participants having similar skill levels together in simultaneous, but separate, levels of competition playing an identical game." It further states that "The relative performances are communicated to only those participants competing at the same skill level." The '913 patent also provides for a "wireless receiving device" to store skill levels and a "telephonic link" to collect information and update skill levels. The objective of the '913 patent was to prevent "user discouragement" that could arise from "direct comparisons between users at different levels."

Secondary References / General Knowledge

• Known Types of Competition Formats: The "Detailed Description of the Preferred Embodiment" of US11338189 itself outlines common competition formats existing prior to the invention: "1) Open contests: where large numbers of players enter an event, and all of the entrants are competing against each other for a single prize pool. 2) Head-to-head: where competitors are matched between a relatively small number of players identified to compete head-to-head against each other. 3) Team competitions: where two or more people are teamed to compete in head-to-head elimination against other similar sized teams in match play or total score competitions." These illustrate the common ways players desired to compete.
• Motivation for Increased User Engagement: The background and summary of US11338189 explicitly state the motivation for its invention: "competition among friends, or with strangers of similar experience, or the ability at ones option, sometimes for an extra consideration, to compete in a separate team or individual contest, offers the opportunity of increased enjoyment and prizes." It also notes, "This increases not only the sense of community, but provides greater opportunities for the satisfaction of beating friends as well as winning prizes." This demonstrates that the desire for varied social and competitive experiences, leading to increased enjoyment and participation, was a recognized need.
• Standard Database Management and Scoring Logic: A PHOSITA would possess knowledge of how to manage player data, game inputs, scoring rules, and group affiliations within a database system, and how to perform calculations to generate standings for various competitive contexts.

Obviousness Argument: Combination of '913 Patent with General Knowledge

A PHOSITA, at the time of the invention of US11338189 (priority date of January 10, 2006), with knowledge of the '913 patent and the general state of competitive gaming, would have found the independent claims of US11338189 obvious.

The '913 patent provides a central computing system that manages participant groups (specifically, by skill level) for an "identical game" and communicates "relative performances" to members within their respective skill levels. This establishes a system capable of:

1. Receiving game inputs from users.
2. Processing these inputs to generate performances/scores.
3. Defining and managing competitive groups.
4. Calculating standings within these groups.
5. Communicating these standings to users.

The primary distinction of US11338189 is the simultaneous application of a single user's performance to multiple, distinct competitive groups (beyond just skill levels) with different sets of opponents, and the maintenance and transmission of separate standings for each of these groups.

Motivation for Combination:
A PHOSITA, motivated by the clearly articulated desire to enhance user engagement, provide more diverse competitive opportunities, and cater to social interaction (as highlighted in US11338189 itself, stating "increased enjoyment and prizes" and "greater opportunities for the satisfaction of beating friends as well as winning prizes"), would have found it obvious to extend the functionality of the system taught by the '913 patent.

Rationale for Combination:
Given the '913 patent's foundation of managing player participation and calculating standings within defined groups, a PHOSITA would logically consider allowing a single player to simultaneously enroll in various other types of known competitive groups (e.g., user-generated "friends" groups, "team" competitions, as well as the skill-based groups of '913). The technical leap to achieve this would be straightforward:

• Receiving user input for multiple contests (Claims 1.b.i, 14.b, 24.c): Once a user performs a single action (e.g., making an event selection related to a game), the system (as established by '913) already receives this input. To apply this input to multiple contexts would involve simply associating that single input with all the user's selected competitive groups in the system's database.
• Separately and simultaneously applying event selections (Claims 1.b.i, 14.b, 24.c): The '913 patent already demonstrates the capability to separately process a player's performance within a specific skill group. Extending this to process the same input against the rules and opponent pools of multiple, concurrently active groups (e.g., a skill group, a friends group, a team group) for a single player would be a matter of conventional database queries and scoring logic. The "simultaneous" aspect relates to the processing of the single performance against all relevant group parameters at or near the same time.
• Storing and transmitting separate results and standings (Claims 1.b.ii-iii, 24.d-e): The '913 patent already teaches communicating "relative performances" within separate skill levels. A PHOSITA would readily understand that if a single player's performance is being evaluated in multiple, distinct groups, the results and standings for each of those groups would naturally be stored separately (e.g., in a database, as explicitly mentioned in US11338189) and transmitted to the user, allowing them to track their progress in each competition. The inclusion of "real-time" transmission is a common feature in interactive online gaming systems.
• Single entry and multiple entry contests (Claims 1.b.iii, 14.b, 24.e): These terms refer to administrative aspects of contest participation (e.g., how many times a user can join a contest). Implementing such entry rules within a system that manages multiple contests would be an obvious business decision and technical detail for a PHOSITA.

Conclusion:
Therefore, the independent claims of US11338189, which describe a system, device, and method for conducting multiple contests with a single performance, would have been obvious. A PHOSITA, when faced with the problem of enhancing user engagement and providing diverse competitive experiences in online/mobile gaming (a problem acknowledged in US11338189), would have been motivated to combine the existing central game management, grouping, and scoring capabilities of the '913 patent with the general knowledge of various competition formats (open, head-to-head, team) and standard database management techniques. This combination would lead to the obvious solution of allowing a single user's game inputs to be simultaneously processed and scored across multiple, distinct competitive groups, with individual standings provided for each.