Rationale
The rationale for public participation in patent application review is that knowledgeable persons in fields relevant to a particular patent application will provide useful information to patent examiners if the proper forum is provided. One model for such a forum is a wiki model where the public may submit prior art and commentary relevant to a given patent application and patent examiners can consult that forum. The hoped-for effect is that patent examination will be more efficient and thorough thus patents that do issue will be of higher quality than is currently possible.
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