Patent Trolls and Your Great Ideas
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 ก.ย. 2019
- To Patent.... or NOT to Patent - that is the question!
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"A patent is really a license to be sued." - Arthur C. Clarke
Fran, your comments are spot on. In addition to my job as engineering manager, I worked as a patent and trademark administrator for my company - 100+ patents, U.S. and international, and we spent the vast majority of our budget on defending these once granted. Subsequently, I worked for a Fortune 200 company as an engineering manager. It was known as a multibillion dollar patent law firm with an attached R&D and manufcturing subsidiary :-). They used patents extremely strategically, filing and refiling process patents to prevent competitors from marketing their products.
Thanks for your great work!
Ah, so right. I owned a little company where we designed and manufactured special clever mechanical things for industrial customers. Doing the patent dance turned out to be a costly waste of time. The wasted time was the worst part. The ability to bring a product to market quickly is hamstrung by endless paperwork and only gives your competition a heads-up about what you are working on. In the end, however good your attorney is you will find that Giant Multinational, Inc. has a better one, and their attorneys are on staff, not working by the hour.
I was approached *many times* by some random guy who had a patent that wanted to license me to build the product. Every single one of these inventions lacked manufacturability and most simply could not possibly function. One guy came to me with a patent and two costly looking consultants. He told me about this new device that would revolutionize an industry. In the meeting with them I typed a description into my computer and came up with several examples of other companies selling that very product just as they had for years. Consultants will *always* say your idea is great and that they can help you sell it.
If you still feel the urge to get a patent do spend the time to work with an engineer with experience in the market this product is intended for. Yes, there is the possibility your idea could be compromised but a well written NDA is enforceable and (generalizing here) I trust engineers more than lawyers. Once you have built a working model and validated that it can work and that there is a market for the product then you can hire a reputable patent firm to walk the paperwork for you. Expect to pay about $15k to get the patent rolling. There will likely be significant additional costs.
For my business it simply wasn't worth it. There are other ways to protect your IP. Cast parts I had made in China had drawings using a different company logos and incorrect part names (hydraulic motor mount was called a pipe flange) to obscure their function. Publishing some details or descriptions in a public but obscure place or selling even one item can help defend against others patenting something you have already developed. A competitor of mine lost the heart of one core patent when it was challenged in court. The court ruled the patent was too obvious and was part of industry standard practise (or similar wording).
Patents are best for highly technical things. I never worked in consumer products but that is where the giant corporations and Chinese copycats live. If I had an idea for a great new shower head, for example, I would talk to companies that make shower heads and see if they had any interest in working with me. Terms could be worked out after that. First I would make sure I really, really knew about shower heads though.
This comments needs more thumbs ups (no, really).
@@750kv8 Thank you! It is terribly frustrating to me that we live in a nation with so much opportunity for invention, creation, and business while so few invest the curiosity to learn even the basics. I am afraid this lack of practical knowledge is spreading.
In high school I took various shop classes though I was on the college track. Doing so wasn't uncommon in that time and place. Do kids get anything like that today?
I sold my business last year and have spent some time playing. I have considered checking whether my local school system has an appropriate opening for volunteer mentoring, business, shop, mechanical engineering etc. It's either that or start another business, but that sounds too much like work.
Fran.. Truth told.
In 92 my father prototyped and patented a medical device to replace the electrically timed inflatable leg cuffs + physical massage required for immobilized coma patients to avoid blood clotting.
It was purely a mechanical device that would flex & extend the ankle, effectively moving blood by the manipulation of the calf muscle. It utilized only vacuum, which is available in most hospitals. It was non-electrical so less hoops for approvals.. and it utilized force limiting safeguards.
He was turned down by the big medical equipment providers.. then it ended up being their many lawyers vs his none. It really dejected him.
✌❤
The medical Corpos are inhabited by the lowest of the human trash. None of the prices people pay are at their real point, all are inflated ludicrously. I mean look at that human sewage Shrikelly (or whatever his name is), it took THAT to get people to outrage? That sum isn't even remotely close to how big products people need so they don't die.
Patent. IE, where an intermediary is can slip in thief.
@@aserta True story.
In terms of contrasted US outrage.. Tea was thrown into the ocean over a 1.5% tax. Today.. 40%+ is taken out of paychecks automatically. What is being thrown into the sea? Nothing.
Mind controlled sheeple on two sides of a divided & conquered fence.
I've actually had that device on my legs, after a blood poisoning saga, from a bike crash. Thank you to your father his idea saved my feet.
A patent is only as good as your pockets are deep. I found this out the hard way years ago, far better to get to market first, then even if someone else tries to patent the idea you got there first and can claim prior art.
Spot on!!!
Not for free though. One of my products was patented by someone a few months after I brought it to market. I had to front about 15,000 dollars lawyers fees despite having all the prior art well documented before they'd settle. If it had required actually challenging the patent at the USPTO with my prior art, you are looking at 50,000 or more. Prior art and being first to market doesn't even really protect you.
@@GigsVT Then you go for costs against the other side, don't know where in the world you are but you would certainly be awarded costs against such persons in the UK and probabely the rest of Europe as well, I would think it is much the same in the US.
Treble damages are available in the U.S. for "willful infringement", but it must be proven.
@@MrShobar You aren't going to get treble damages for a frivolous claim from someone who patented something that was already on the market. It's a hard enough battle to make a case for them to pay legal fees. In theory you could get punitive damages in addition to legal fees.
One thumbs down ...... must have been from a troll trying to steal ideas !
Chris Yanez (***) thumbs down...(👎).....must have been from a troll trying to steal (or improve) ideas!
😅😀😂...It’s all in fun, and meant to “see what I did here”
This is why for the last 30 years, that everything I develop is Creative Commons, GPL, etc.
Fran you've spoken truth today ... It's a nasty mess ... Crooks at pen point ... Thanks for sharing your challenges .. bless your day and thanks ... Ed in Phoenix writes
Don Lancaster, back in the day, had quite a bit to say in his case against patents as well. Patents are a total waste of time, money, effort and sanity. They supposedly give you the legally exclusive right to make or use your "invention" or "design". But what it really amounts to is the requirement that the patent holder take upon themselves the super expensive defense against infringement. Which is in stark contrast to copyright infringement being a crime, complete with application of law enforcement, fines and jail time. Which has always seemed odd to me. It's like, sure, your home is your legal property but it's up to you and you alone to defend it against invading foreign armies or put it out if it catches on fire.
Patents are a way to bait people into publishing their techniques, so it actually does, but the benefit is primarily intended for the benefit of everyone other than the patent holder.
Ken Logsdon oops, i commented before i read yours. Remember the active filter cookbook and of course the CMOS, too.
These are not trolls, they are outright scammers.
Thanks Fran, a lot of useful advice on things I had never even thought about until now.
8:40 A Washington DC address is a sure sign of a scam; USPTO is located in Alexandria, Virginia.
tRump has a Washington DC address, so that makes sense.
Thanks Fran . Sounds like you have a good handle on things to me , keep things to yourself and ignore tolls.
As has already been stated a patent is almost useless now days. I used to work for a small manufacture and instead of patenting something we simply made a drawing and applied for a design copyright. This gave us better protection than a patent was cheaper and never expired. This was something I learned from looking at what Mettel was doing to keep people from making copies of there toys. Hope this helps
Some great advice here! Thanks Fran.
Do a search for "The case against patents" by Don Lancaster (free PDF to download).
Don is the man. I think I own every Radio Shack book of his and read Guru's Lair as often as I could
Free PDF... Not copyrighted?
OH YES! I've dealt with domain trolls. Here's a tip... never... EVER let a domain expire if you think there's any chance you'll ever use it again. Russian companies buy up expired domains and ransom them back for thousands of dollars. Fortunately, I think they realized I wasn't going to play that game and let their registration expire and I snagged it back for $10. :) Although, I was counting down the MINUTES to when it would be available again.
In the 80’s I designed a car alarm. Never had it registered. What I did was fill the custom box with Polyester Resin so all the components could not be seen. Of course if it failed the whole unit had it to be junked. Made some money to help out in my education. My idea of the alarm was developed from the electronic courses I was taking at that time and it used new components that just became available. Love your channel thanks for sharing
One of my first jobs in electronics was in the prototyping department of a small custom engineering company. A large part of my work was reverse engineering products for other companies and I spent hours removing potting compound and drawing schematics. Under the potting I found many other tricks that don't work either like grinding off the chip ID or folding the legs of ICs backward, none of these work. You are only making a disposable product because anyone who wants your circuit will get it. There are good reasons to use potting but obscurity is not one of them.
I worked as a web developer for a short time contract at the US Patent and Trademark Office in Alexandria VA. I learned a lot about the patent process and made quite a few unique friends while there.
There is a cafe (500 Dulany St building) that is publicly accessible and is usually filled with lawyers and legal counsel for the USPTO who are geeks at heart and have really advanced degrees in Engineering and Science. These people are so fascinating.
If you were to post your tools it would become the prior art that would prevent someone from patenting them. There still are trade secrets but they aren't laws, they are contracts a NDA is an example of trade secrets. You are only held to trade secrets if you sign a contract.
I just discovered you with your previous video about SawStop and their patent trolling. Then I spent way too long watching a bunch of your videos. Holy crap are you cool! I wish I was half as cool, smart and talented as you.
Finally someone is talking about all the crap the SMBs get, the domain scams bug me so much! Thnx for the video Fran.
Fran, would you actually have disadvantages if you just "gave your ideas away", but *not* in a patent, but instead in an "open source" or "open hardware" kind of way, like "Here it is, it's been useful for me, so it'll be useful for you as well" - and if someone patents it then, you could always get that patent invalidated by showing that it was actually your idea and therefore the "prior art" clause would apply. Do you think that going about it like this would a) make your life considerably worse or b) make the world a better place, because people have better tools to do stuff with?
These questions are not to change your mind, but instead to find out how you think about this, and what your thought process in this regard is?
What makes you think getting a patent invalidated is either inexpensive or easy?
Thanks, Fran. Very informative. 💎
I think Don Lancaster covered the case against patents 30 yrs ago. Along with active filters and CMOS. Great show!
Fran, you're awesome and talk more sense than almost anyone else around here
james archibald houston worked for corning glass back in the day and he describes how tightly held some of those trade secrets are, and in one story after spending countless hours working on a piece of glass he was passed that information by a night janitor.
The same thing happened concerning my "fictitious name" registration in my state that has to be renewed every five years for a $50.00 fee. Some company representing themselves as the state was sending me mail to remind me of the renewal and asking for $125.00. I did not bite. The actual fee was still $50.00 and I got the real notice closer to renewal time.
I worked with a patent lawyer on an idea once. One thing that he said is if a product has been offered for sale it can't be granted a patent except the original designer has around a year or less to apply. So if you want to set something loose on the world for everyone to benefit and not let one company own it just sell the item.
You should put all your previous t-shirts in an ondemand store! I always wanted one of the circuit design ones.
Back in the '90s, I worked for a company that made analog and digital signal processors for musicians (ART, one of the two companies that sprang from the ashes of MXR). I don't remember the details, but a patent troll had written to the company (and other companies in that space) saying that our products violated a patent. The patent apparently described a microprocessor that converted audio with an A/D converter, applied some signal processing math, and then output the processed audio with a D/A converter. It may have had a bit more detail on what constituted "processing" but really, they described WHAT EVERY DIGITAL EFFECT BOX ON THE PLANET FOR THE PAST TWENTY-SOMETHING YEARS DID. I remember my boss laughing at that, pointing out that there was plenty of prior art for what was claimed by the patent. I think they threw away the letter without response and I never heard of it again.
Years later, I'm working in an industry that produced barcode scanners. There has been a lot of innovation in that space over the years, the use of lasers with complicated mirror assemblies, CCDs and interesting signal processing techniques, and so on. A patent troll was going after many manufacturers claiming they violated their patent which described-- in the most generic wording you've ever seen-- a system that reads the bars, measures them, and then outputs codes. Again, THAT'S WHAT EVERYONE DOES, in some form. Again, the patent claim was laughed at, but they did spend some money for the lawyers to draft a response. My guess is that after the lawyers stopped laughing, they spent less than a minute writing a response and that was the end of it. But I did hear about another company that took the claim seriously and bowed to the patent troll's claim, probably paying them lots of money.
I came up with a continuous hot water system many decades ago...when I contacted a patent lawyer I found out that it would take over $8500 just to get in the door...I was 12 so that was a no-go :(
Hello Fran,
Glad you mentioned Patreon, I don't recollect switching notifications off but I haven't seen any for quite a while now. I'll go check, wonder if anyone else has had the same issue?
Edit: just looked, notifs are apparently on, yet last was 23 July. Doesn't appear to be in my spam filter, wonder what's going on?
8o.
The whole purpose of patents was to create incentive for sharing good ideas by giving the creator a period of protected exclusivity. Advance the rate of progress for everyone by not wasting time reinventing the wheel over and over .. that's just not how things work anymore. For personal inventions and tools that never had any mass commercialization, one idea is to document everything and just add instructions to a will placing everything in the public domain after death.
09:40 I used to get those letters from companies trying to look genuine/official when I had website domain names many years ago (back around 2000 to 2003) wanting to charge me $400 for a $30 domain name, they also sneaked into the small print that I would be surrendering my domain name(s) to them by signing the letter and/or paying them whichever happened first and that I would have to pay them $1,000 per website domain to get back my own domain names if I stopped paying them whenever they decided to bill me, the letters I received all came from a PO box in New York, I am over in the UK..
It still happens now I see..
🙈
Patents are a pain. Many moons ago, before Fran was born, a colleague and I were working in a UK government lab. We were making small numbers of pcbs, hand drawing them with nail varnish. One day we wrote some information on a couple of boards with a particular make of felt-tip pen, and found the information was left in the copper after etching. We mentioned it in a letter to an electronics magazine. A few months later a major electronics components supplier started selling etch resist pens. We bought one and found that they were exactly the same type of pen with a label stuck over, of course it had been patented. We wouldn't have gained personally because the government would have owned the rights if a patent had been applied for. Named brands are also ripped off left right and centre, I bought a "Gilet" razor the other day!
yes it is sad Fran that we have to deal with this I had company steal one my business photos to use to advertise their business
I did a "patent of idea" because I was told it would cover my idea. Wrong, I thought I was selling a use of it but they paid me $1500 and used it in over 5,000 locations. Boy did I learn how to waste money, lol.
Volvo are heroes. 60 years and a million lives saved. They'll remove my 850R from my cold dead hands haha.
Yeah, it looks like all of my motor/generator secrets and free/clean energy concepts are going to die with me.
Yeah. My calculations and drawings for a time machine...they'll go with me too.
I agree with you completely. The whole system of patents and copy-write had been corrupted, particularly in the US where there are legal firms that just buy up IP and then go out and sue people for infringement. They make all there money of licensing or damages.
On the other hand there are companies that just steal your work and think they can win because they have more money for lawyers. Sometimes this goes horribly wrong! I don't know how many of you are old enough to have use Window$ NT in the early days. M$ made the mistake of using some code from Sun Microsystems version of Unix. Most of this was under an Open Source licence, but Solaris had a propitiatory UI. Sun sued, won, got a huge payout in damages, and M$ had to put a chunk of text in their EULA acknowledging this! For at least adecade, if you opened the About Windows thing, and clicked on credits you could scroll through a long screed about how this software included code from Sun Microsystems. I don't think that M$ have got any better. They still try to sue people for stuff which is Open Source, and most of the time they get away with it. I am very suspicsious of what they are doing with there version of Chrome, and the Linux support in Windows 10.
Hey Fran.. are you reading these comments on older videos? If yes.. i wonder if you are still planning on making that follow up video? Thanks anyway for your perspective.. quite eye opening
I agree 100% Fran over 7 years now I new Patent was not an option, maybe open source if you dont want your idea to get disappeared that's only option to me.
I looked into patenting an invention 15 years ago. Came to the same conclusion, too expensive to patent, FAR too expensive to defend and maintain a patent and a certainty to get ripped off, probably by a far eastern company. A pointless exercise...
I wonder how many people invent things, and really didn't know it? At my last job, it was common for all of use to build custom test rigs for specific purposes - in my case, for hospital beds and call - bell systems.
I never thought of it as " inventing" something...we called it " MacGyverizing".
Copyrights...I know a woman with copyrighted artwork, who has found knockoffs that had her signature on them....
Lets touch on the subject of Sleaze ball Patent Liars. Buddy of mine, auto mechanics pay check, got an idea for a carbide tipped gasket scraper. He showed it to me, and I said 'not patent-able, and probably already done'. He went ahead anyway, and was paying for the search in monthly installments. Sure enough, things were looking real promising, they were close. He paid his last installment, then a week later.......call from Liar.....Sorry, we found a patent similar that was granted just 6 months ago. Thank You for your business. They got him for $3500.
When should something be trade secret and when should something be open source? Is it down to personal preference?
from my understanding thanks to mickey mouse money copyright been extending to 75 years after the death of the holder in the USA
I've dealt with the domain scammers. This year it was web design firms in India. I only have two domains right now, and it was either after renewing one of them, or actually working on transferring a client's site, I got an absurd number of phone calls about a domain I didn't purchase and do not own (even per the WHOIS). They would claim they got the info from GoDaddy, whom I called and wouldn't tell me anything about the domain in question. Eventually the calls slowed down (I still get a call every now and then) but the first couple days it was insane. Call after call about a domain I didn't even register, but was similar to one I own.
True....patents are for companies that are already rich not for DIY or inventors.
Don’t even get me started on the scammers that “help” you get your idea patented...
I wish there was a way to make some of my ideas "world wide public open source".. so that they cannot ever be patented or claimed by anyone, ever..
Get it built in China, it will be WWPOS before your first products hit the shelves.
I used to get the non governmental letters to administer my operating authority insurance filings fuel taxand safety compliance and multuide of other things for my company for small fee circular file is were they all wound up
The system, as it stands, discourages creativity - which chokes the economy, hurting everyone.
Wow! I didn't think a patent was that complicated. I have patents through my employer or at least my name is on them but didn't realize the complexity of it.
On the subject of your T-shirts, it would be a great pity if you stopped doing them altogether, but I do understand. Maybe once a year? I have 3, and have just ordered this new one. In the UK they are expensive after P&P and transaction fees, but they are the best quality. One has been washed 4 times with no visible deterioration! If you can keep doing them please do. I like your designs. The Commodore 64 Basic is quite a conversation starter.
I used to buy _only_ printed T-shirts from the US, because EU sizes are so weird, and always at least two at a time.
But nowadays, packages _always_ get lots of fees in Swedish customs so it isn't affordable anymore.
I have just one thing to say: "I have an old TI calculator just like the one you have. Got it back in the 70's. :)
I have designed many, many tools and techniques for electronic manufacturing, hydro/pneumatic testing, and systems control. Not one have I patented I have simply made then used them and moved on, to the next one. I have left no design documents, for anyone to copy, and once the system or manufacturing product is complete I've dismantled the invention. In this way I can use a part or many parts in the next iteration. If I had patented it I would have to do it again on the next advance, without I just do it.
There was a couple of things I invented that I personally could never have built, one of those is the inflatable rooms for space stations, I happened to mention it a long time ago to a Mr Bigelow while in a bar at a Pacific Island hotel. 1998 or 1999 if I remember correctly. He said to me what if i take your ideas and use them, I said please do I have no finances to do them you are most welcome.
Bigelow Aerospace was started 1999, you can search to see what they produce. BEAM their first HAB is identical to my invention. The others have refinements and changes using the N.A.S.A. patents they collected later.
To me there is no point inventing things and patenting them if they are not going to be made or used. Also you have to be careful when you work for a company to check your employment contract, in many companies there is a clause that says anything and I mean ANYTHING you invent or design while you work for them is their property not yours. Whether you did it at work or at home it makes no difference, it belongs to them.
So yeah keep mouth shut, don't use work computers, cellphone etc, and no dates on your designs or guess what, you lose. Even years later if they can prove you were employed while you were even thinking about the idea, sorry you just lost it. And yes I did lose some hence my policy now.
Sorry to Bogart your video Fran, Last thing I'll say never give a sub contractor enough of the project to know what they are building, and check who actually own the 'new' contractor.
There are quite a few reasons to get patents and you touched on some. Yes, you can get one to extract royalties from others or to well. For example, IBM has many patents for royalty purposes as part of the business model. One I am aware of (because I worked for a company that developed the first machines for this) is "Chemical Mechanical Planarization". This is an important semiconductor manufacturing process step that allows making multi-layer integrated circuits. IBM has made billions (with a "B") from royalties for this. Other reasons are because if you don't, somebody else will and then YOU can lose the right to manufacture what your own product. Another is as part of an intellectual property strategy where a company's patent portfolio is part of its worth and they can be used defensively against competitors or offsetting trade-offs can be made with competitors. It can get extremely complicated. And then, there is the situation where you get into litigation. I was involved in a case between two fairly small companies and one had a million dollars in legal fees and the other a million and a half dollars. And then you have to deal with how the CAFC (Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit) suddenly makes a 180 turn on case law. For example, for pretty much forever infringement required an "element by element" match to the patent claims. It was NOT infringement if some combination of your elements produced the same result as some combination of the patent claims. Then a case appeared involved fiber optics where a patent (and I may have the technicalities backwards, but it doesn't matter to make the point) had one claim of an undoped glass core and another claim of a negatively doped cladding (helps the light travel). Someone starting making a fiberoptic that had an undoped cladding and a positively doped core. The result of the TWO SEPARATE claims combined produced the same result, but it failed the "element by element" analysis. The CAFC said "close enough" and the world of patent attorneys just shook their heads because this completely changed case precedent. Speaking of "close enough", a lot of litigation revolves around determining not if something exactly infringes or not, but how close. A patent owner is usually allowed a "reasonable range of equivalence" so you might not spot on infringe, but close enough. If it is a pioneering patent (like the first laser patent) you get a large range of equivalence. If in a mature patent space (like automobile transmissions) you would get a very small range equivalence. Also, while this wasn't always so, you need to actively defend your patent or you will lose your rights. Almost nobody outside the patent business knows the original purpose which was to encourage innovation 1) By giving protection to the inventor and 2) By requiring the inventor to reveal what enables the patent so that others can try to IMPROVE on it. So it has always been a two-edged sword.
Renaissance artists knew about the camera obscura, so it's likely a few "cheated" by tracing images before making complete paintings with them. It'd just involve setting up something like a small shed or booth where everything else outside is well lit.
In regards to other stuff, it's likely there are a lot of well kept trade secrets because things like the machining trades to make something like the Antikythera mechanism were supposedly "lost" until you had things like swiss clock makers and such. (It's likely those skills were kept in some practice here and there, but the artifacts lost in time. And the values of the products were such that the means of making them was something special to keep secret.)
Modern times it's a bit more tricky. Sometimes ideas that are too obvious or common still get patented. Also the current system really isn't geared towards the common person, prices have been corporatized and process heavy with bureaucracy that makes tracking a job in itself which keeps it out of reach. Of course that seems more of a different topic in itself.
Doesn't a published video that predates a parent filing demonstrate prior art?
It starts the filing clock running, because it demonstrates the existence of the invention. Something to be avoided.
@@MrShobar But if the inventor's intention is not to patent but instead to defend against a later patent for the same invention, how does the patent clock matter?
I have ideas. I have no illusions that they might be valuable to others, nor do I have the energy or resources to apply for, market or defend a patent for those ideas. I tend to make them public once they're coherent enough for others to understand with the firm belief that once they are public others can't challenge my right to use them.
I misunderstood your question. I assumed that you were interested in filing, not defeating someone else's right by the disclosure of potentially disabling prior art. Bear in mind that the sufficiency of your "prior art" publication may be rebutted by any patentee.
As someone once said, a patent gives you the right to sue someone. Once you patent it's public. I have done alot of work as trade secrets because they are .. secret
Management of intellectual property:
A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.
Hi guys! I have been thru the whole IP proces in Germany . 14 monthes later i sow my idea everywhere . I was thinking to share thru youtube my future ideas for free . Does anyone knows what the implication of that is ? My concern is . A big company stoles my idea get a patent on it and sueing me for sharing my own idea with the world . God bless !
"Totally legal!!" ROTFLOL
Given your core demographic, Franlab branded tools like soldering irons and bench power supplies might be more popular than teashirts.
That's a good idea.
The concept of Patents was originally to give its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, selling, and importing an invention for a limited period of years (effectively a legal monopoly), in exchange for publishing an enabling public disclosure of the invention. This provided a value to the public, by releasing the patented invention into the public domain after the time limit - thus allowing that information to be used to move the state of the art forward. Rather than dying with the creator as with trade secrets, patents ensured our collective knowledge would grow - benefiting all of us.
Of course that was in the past, and for all the reasons you state, patents have become a way not to produce anything of value for humanity, but instead to litigate and extort money from anyone who does. However, all is not lost. Most of these attempts at extortion fail because of several things: prior art, and open source licensing.
In the first place, if you can show that you or someone else who had no relation to the patent trolls were using the process in question well before they came up with the patent 'idea' - then that nullifies their claim on it. Secondly, there are open source licenses you can use that both provide value to others, while protecting you from patent troll claims - assuming of course, that you are the original creator.
These are my views only on this subject - IANAL. Contact a patent attorney before making any important patent decisions.
Ref:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_troll
opensource.com/law/14/4/us-supreme-court-on-patent-trolling
www.wired.com/2014/06/supreme-court-deals-major-blow-to-patent-trolls/
James Watt's patent on the separate condenser held back the development of the steam engine for many years. Ironic when you consider his status as "the father of the steam engine".
I have just patented and trademarked "Congress of the United States". Fran will get a 10% cut of my "proceeds".
Ideas, in and of themselves, are always built on what exists. Ideas, in and of themselves, are worth nothing. However, if you are able to take an idea and build something with it then you have something to sell or give away. This is the important thing, the implementation.
The problem we have today is that there is a strange idea that ideas are worth something and people therefore want to protect the something. The old saying that there is nothing new under the sun is more true today than most want to admit. Every idea you come up with has either benn thought of before by many others or is being thought of now by many others. These ideas arise because of some sort of need. When you think of it, how often does that need come up? Hmm.
Many years ago, I was given advice to ignore patents and trade secrets. If you wanted to stay ahead of the crowd then be prepared to continually advance your implementation of your product. Cheap copies will come so you prepare yourself for the next iterations that will be much superior.
The other aspect was to document all of your developments, get them notorised by the courts or appropriate people and then mail those documents to yourself and keep them locked up in a safe. You can then release and use copies of those document for whatever purposes and if someone comes after you, you can bring out the originals in court for the judge to open. This is a technique that has been used in various fields to protect from bad players.
The idea that you should protect your ideas and techniques from others is millennia old and has held technological development back. The patent system is farce. When I was in my 20's, the cost for a national patent was in excess of $5000 and many times that if you wanted to register elsewhere in the world. That was in the early 80's.
I have a list of ideas
Everytime I tell anuone they say "YOU SHOULD PATENT THAT IMMEDIATELY "
Patents run between $14k - $140k
Im stuck
Just for proof someone should take hat or sunglasses and incorporate infra-red bulbs into them - SO NOONE CAN TAKE YOUR PICTURE !
The picture will always come out as a big white blur and it doesn't matter what format is used. Digital or Analog. I'm surprised no one has invented these for famous people yet
Well I have an idea, and a prototype for something I made, and need to iterate the design of.... and I am afraid to do anything until I have some sort of IP. I want to make this thing, and use part of the proceeds to fund relevant charities... I already sat with a patent attorney. I feel like I am screwed if I do, and screwed if I don't
Wow. Just wow!
I have a machine I am currently developing, its my own original idea and I have working prototypes in the hands of musicians and have already been used on album releases. I keep getting 'advice' to get a patent, get IP protection, ohh those nasty Asians are gonna steal your idea and make it for cents swindling you out millions!!!
Fact is I am just one bloke tinkering with electronics that has an innovative idea and no intention of being some corporate business freak, I am happy to make my little box for a niche market of people that will use it to make interesting art. If I can make a few bob of it or a career then fine, if it doesn't work out then so be it, I have other ideas also I have a career already that isn't going to disappear any time soon.
What I have found is some people love to open their mouths and voice their misguided opinions on what you should do with your life even though they are not doing it themselves, they get all defensive when you say "thanks but no thanks" like you should be grateful for their sage like guidance.
Even creative commons can be problematic. Thomas Sanladerer got a CNC router, and the design of the parts was licensed under CC attribution non-commercial share-alike. But when he tried to design a new part for it - completely from scratch - and release it under public domain CC0, the original designer arced up saying he couldn't do that because he had to release it under the same license as the original. He claimed that because it looks similar to his other part, and mechanically fits on his machine, that meant it was a derivative of his design, and hence needs to adhere to his CC license terms. To me that's ridiculous. If I want to design a new, more efficient water pump for my car, does that mean I have to license the design for the existing water pump from the manufacturer just because it happens to fit in the same place? There are plenty of third-party car parts makers out there, and we don't see them getting dragged through the courts every time a new part is released.
Reasons why I did not take part in your T shirt campaign, although I kinda wanted to. You showed a video of how you silk screen printed the logo, but the bonfire shirts are printed by a machine in a different technique, which fades if machine washed. Also, they don't offer my size, yes I'm that big.
You left out the greatest "troll" of them all---That company that George Foreman works for that advertises extensively on cable TV.
Usually patents for individual inventors aren't practical. But good inventors are scarce and lawyers are plentiful. Take your ideas to a big company that'll do the patent and defend it, then take royalties on the sales. You still get your name on the patents, but the company owns it. Spend your time doing what you like, inventing, not pushing legal papers around.
I have a great idea bet I could take a patent on it: " Abolish private property!"
If they were pocket tees I would get a few of them. I don't get tees any more unless they have pockets. I have to have a place for my pocket protector LOL. any more the only consistent tee shirts out there that have pockets are my trusty Carhartt's. good video thanks for sharing...Vic
Yes yes and yes, I hate to admit that you have to spend the money on the patents but I had a big one stolen from me in 2004 And in the middle of production during 2013 we received a cease and desist from a major manufacturer who had bought the patent rights even though we had military documentation from as far back as 1998! I’ve since learned my lesson and have two patents on the main product line as well as registered trademarks, I’ve gotten bitten there as well so as much as I hate to admit it when has to protect oneself with patents and trademarks otherwise the risk of having someone else take your great ideas is very real.
Consiously or not, you did a good Kyle Kulinski parody😁
Is there no protection in the US for prior art? Surely if you document your invention and put it out publicly it shows you invented it and they can't patent it?
Yes, but that still announces it, so they can "steal"/use it in practice.
That leaves it up to you to sue, if you can afford it.
here's what to do, just put 'patent pending ' on it and nothing else...keeps people from trying to steal it... and you don't have to worry about patent trolls
Good points
My nephew is an mechanical engineer in his early 30's and he helped his younger sister get a patent so I'm not sure it's not as difficuly as you believe.
Let's say you have an invention and you post videos of it on YT, and you have official documents that say you registered the content of your idea as Intellectual Property, and you have many other ways to prove that your idea is yours by simply looking at the date of those official documents (in the UK, the Intellectual Property registry costs £50 and its only function is to assert that you sent certain content at a certain date, but they do not look at the actual content, and it is valid for five years, upon which you have to pay the renewal fee).
Now, let's say someone else creates an actual patent with your content and doesn't even bother to make necessary modifications to your idea (why so, if the patent of your idea doesn't exist yet?).
Could you litigate against that?
Preparing for a patent trial cost in the order of tens or hundreds or thousands per month and runs for months and years, so yes you can if you have the money...
whoops im off to check patreon settings ...
A patent is only as good as your financial ability to defend it.
That was a good trump impression! Lol
We used to get these companies that sell compliance posters federal and state. Thing is you can get them free from the gov't. What a scam.
Take care.
For the little person patents are very much a game of heads I win, tails you lose. Have a great idea that people would want to pay you money for? Great!
Option 1: Go it alone, spend your life's savings develops your idea into a workable product and get it onto the market...only for some bigger company to pull your product apart, learn how it works, and make their own.
Option 2: Maybe you don't have the money to develop your idea, go pitch it to someone and see if you can get them to pay you for it! "Have you a patent? No? Well that's a shame, your idea is very similar to an idea I just this moment had, excuse me I must talk to my patent lawyer".
Option 3: Scrape together your savings into paying for a patent application to protect your IP. Hopefully you have enough left over to make it into a product before the patent gets published so you can make enough money to defend said patent against companies that are either going to shamelessly rip you off, or find the crack in your patent that they can squeeze between to make their own product that does exactly the same thing.
The patents game is played by the big companies with large chests of money and rabid lawyers.
I've taken a patent course, and a patent is only as good if you have the financial resources to defend it in court. If you can't defend it ion court because you don't have the money, the patent is useless. If you manufacture in China, the factory you make at will steal it, and I have seen examples where the factory writes up a patent and shows it to you that your idea is already patented, then the factory will steal your idea. Make it in the USA, and a Copyright or Trademark is much easier and less costly to defend. Link your physical design to the copyright by silk screened wording on the board.
Fran, one reason some folks aren't buying the t-shirts anymore is because of the quality (or lack thereof) of the shirt itself. I bought the C-64 script shirt a while back (I bought two in fact) and the shirts were the thinnest, crappiest t-shirts I've ever seen, or more importantly, felt. I've thought about buying others you've put out but I'm not going to buy something crap just because it says Fran Lab on it. You should apply the same attitude to your t-shirt suppliers as you do to the companies that supply the parts for your pedals. Oh, you've stopped selling those as well... *sigh*
i love you fran!! just saw you today!! first time... would you like to come sailing on northport harbor?? longisland.....ny my restored 1966 allberg sail boat...
The contents of the fine print make it legal. Somebody needs to patent a bigger magnifying glass; or do as I do, assume anything with a load of fine print is a recyclable item. I suppose one could search for a cheaper 'BranLab' t-shirt.
Hi Fran, I am wearing a youtube teespring t-shirt.
I have had problems with people taking my ideas that I did not patent, when I was 18 and 19 I went to supposed government innovation department people that were aa liability and not a help.
You can strike down a patent with "prior art" can't you?
Yeah, that was the problem with my atempt to copyright the C major scale.
IDK if this is valid in the US, but here in Brazil what you can do is this little trick musicians use when making music, before they have a complete album ready: put proof of that idea being yours in a box, then mail it to yourself, and keeping that box for posterity.
If you ever see anyone use your idea, then you can sue them and take the box in as evidence.
Since the post office stamps and dates the mail, and has registration for tracking it, the box becomes an officially verifiable document that's impossible to fake. It's irrefutable evidence.
That will not work... there are several things wrong with that idea.. just to name 1 is ... prove what is in the envelope with out opening it.. once you open it up you don't have any evidence... there are several others
Put IP into the public domain. You will maybe make as much money as if you had a patent without the hassle. $0. You may well save a heap of money not paying lawyers. Put that money into manufacturing first if you wish. What have you to lose by keeping something secret? Another way to look at it is that if somebody wont buy your product in preference to a cheaper Chinese knock off, wasn't going to buy your product anyway. No loss there.
The whole patent process needs to either be completely changed or just eliminated. Patents have no reason to be in public record so that anyone can copy the idea; they should only be viewed as evidence in court. Also, the person or company holding the patent should be freely defended by the USPTO or respective agencies in other countries. I am honestly in favor of just eliminating patents altogether, though. They would be nice if they were sealed from the public viewing, effective for individuals or small companies, and very cheap and easy to obtain, but none of this is the case.