The tradition in patent law is to begin discussing an element then continue discussing said element. I never liked that particular approach because the word “said” seemed odd to me. Instead, my claim drafting practice was to largely avoid the word “said.” Instead, once a claim element is given antecedent basis, I would then refer to it as “the [element].” It appears that my approach is now the conventional wisdom. The chart below shows the breakdown in patents using “said” in Claim 1 vs those using “the.” You’ll note a sharp decline in the popularity of “said” that appears to have begun around the mid 1990’s.
From Jeff Sheldon:
I am going to claim some credit here. My book “how to write a patent application ” came out in about 1990. I advocated for “the” rather than “said” for readability by judges and juries. The book is widely used and updated twice per year. So a generation of patent practitioners have developed with that recommendation.