Lets talk Patent Law And O U Open source!

[Cherryman]

C'Man
The intent is to make a better world ...not a bigger bank acc't !


Chet

I know Chet, that is why I typed so many words, to convince you guys patenting is NOT the way.

Peace.

[Farmhand]

The big thing in my opinion is getting together sufficient proof so that anyone
can prove a certain device was made public by the inventor/s on a certain date,
and maybe how it was made public and some examples of it's use by people who
have gained the knowledge from the public source, things like that.

I agree with Aaron though, being able to prove it to the courts satisfaction
might not be so easy in one place as another. Even from court to court.

I do know one thing though we mustn't let the mere possibility of nasty people
doing nasty things put us off.

The burden of proof could be more for a particular type of device as well.

I'm not a lawyer either so I'm not giving advice just an opinion.

Cheers

P.S. Different lawyers will likely give a different interpretation of laws as well,
if you talk to one he could say you have no hope, but a different one might
say you do.

2nd P.S.

In order to stop a person from getting the patent you would need to take
action against them, but for them to enforce a patent violation or
infringement they would need to take action against you and/or everybody else
they wanted to stop. That would be a lot of work and expense if a lot of
people had them and made it public they had them and used them.

..

[RAMSET]

Well that is not a problem Here?

Farmhand
Quote:
and maybe how it was made public and some examples of it's use by people who
have gained the knowledge from the public source, things like that.

--------------------------
C'Man
No need to be so wordy Bro
Your preachin to the choir !!

I have always said regarding patents in this Venue.

"why hand a man a stick to beat you with"?

THX
Chet

[Aaron]

intellectual property protection

I could easily put up a website, or add a page to an existing one that shows that I came up with everything in the water spark plug thread - in say May 2000. But that doesn't actually prove I actually did so. Things on the Internet can be easily manipulated.

An alternative to the copyright office could be to use a Notary

My point being: the more third party evidence you have (from trusted* sources like a Government department and a Notary), the better your chances will be.

* in the eyes of another Government department or a Judge etc.

The entire internet is cached in multiple locations and this is a valid time stamp I believe - so someone can't just put up a page and backdate it to whenever they want.

I actually do use a Notary Public at my local credit union for the exact reason you say. Not everything but things I see as being more valuable.

I agree with what you're saying but I think it goes back to - how do you enforce it - will depend on how much money you're willing to spend.

If you invented something and disclosed it, you could file for a patent within a year. Someone else could file for a patent on it by lying that they are the inventor - but then it is on you to go on with a legal battle.

I sort of recall something about if you copyright plans or something then it is not eligible to be patented. There was something along those lines but I don't recall.

Here is a great movie about stolen IP - and a rare case where a man defends himself and won millions from the auto companies for stealing his invention of the intermittent windshield wiper control.

Flash of Genius (2008) - IMDb

[Aaron]

provisional patent application

Now I rush to my lawyer and have him to file a provisional patent application. The much cheaper provisional patent provides one year of protection, allows patent pending status, and does not require writing claims. However, before one year expires you must file a non-provisional patent application for your invention.

A provisional is only about $100 + other nominal fees or so and you don't even have to list the claims or take an oath.

Actually, this is a great way to prevent anyone else from patenting your idea. If you just intentionally let the 12 months expire without getting a non-provisional, the invention absolutely is considered public domain at that point and nobody can patent it.

If you want to open source something and prevent anyone from patenting it, file the provisional then give everyone permission to do what they want with it.

[Aaron]

patent claims

For a patent, it is all about the claims and a certain schematic doesn't even cut it. There can technically be two different patents with the identical circuit but if the claims are different, they can be allowed. This is not saying you can just re-explain someone else's patent and get a patent - there are going to be many obvious things that are going to be worded - I just point out the fact that it is really the claims that matter in a patent and nothing else. I was told this directly by a patent attorney and there is plenty agreement on this from IP law resources online.

So on a provisional app, even though claims aren't required, I don't think you are prevented from making them so on the provisional, might as well spell out every single patentable claim possible.

I would have to say patenting IS the way to go if you have the funds and wherewithal to actually get something into production to and you're not interested in open source. In this case, a patent is a good idea.

But if you do want it open sourced, going through the entire patent process is not necessary. Can get the provisional and let it lapse then it becomes non-patentable by anyone else and is considered public domain. So for under $200 or so, you blocked anyone from patenting it and allow it to be open sourced.

[kcarring]

Kyle,

The third point on a patent is conditional i think.

What I mean is that something can be kept proprietary - even in a patent the magic formula doesn't have to be revealed and many of the best inventions being used are not patented and if they are, the "magic secret" is not disclosed.

So IF someone wants to patent something for protection purposes but with the goal that anyone can use it - then everything has to be disclosed in the patent and this keeps anyone else from patenting it, which does protect it.

You may have just stated the solution.

An organization could be the assignees for the patent and there is a public contract stating that the assignees give everyone a right to personal use or even commercial use and this prevents anyone else from patenting it. Thereby protecting it and making it open source.

The only caveat I see is IF it is something that is really "ou" for example, it could be classified and taken away as Chet has mentioned. There certainly are plenty of non "ou" things worthy of open source like different agricultural technologies, etc...

From experience, someone unnamed patented her circuits. Claimed they were to prevent anyone else from patenting them. Claimed they were for open source. Then claimed she had a right to any commercial application.

I see what you mean.

It would make sense, to me, anyway that, hypothetically, for a moment (and for lack of better illustration), you had an entity like Panacea University...

or, one that had gained some "general faith" from the experimenting public.

Let's say that they had a rock solid NDA available to investigate an individuals experiment. Mainly to protect the interest of the experimenter, and allow for them to go into "examination", yet still walk away if so desired.

Then, that individual could go into discussion with Ashweth or a representative of the said organization.

At that time, "The Organization" could present their list of criterion to the inventor. In that list, would be some rules of course, and those rules essentially were in place to protect the best interest of the philantropists involved, and I sort of intentionally use that word (though incorrectly perhaps) because what we are talking about here are individuals who have collectively agreed to back and support the documentation and patent process for game-changing breakthrough technologies.

So, without any real risk for the inventor, knowing full well the organization itself was non-profit and global betterment based, could go into negotiation with "The organization". the organization would then meet with the philanthropists' board of directors, present the technology and an initial assement would be made, to decide if replication was required, or, if the technology had independent studies already done; verification of those studies - preliminaries. If all checked out, a vote would occur, and monies could flow in to protect, patent, and properly document the technology before full dissemination of the technology was made.

So in doing so, full disclosure of pertinent details would be included, as you explained to me... nothing hidden, with minimal chance of others' being able to patent the system.

A great deal of effort, beforehand within "The Organization" would have been focused on deciding what sort of requirements would have to be met before an invention could receive financial protection.

It also, of course could be multi-staged, such that initially the inventor would not be required to fully disclose, and make sure that his idea/invention at least met the base required criteria.

Any such organization, in today's business world seems almost ludicrous, but.. as the future unfolds, maybe not so ludicrous. If the government wishes to continue to make our nation a more difficult place to escape corporate and capitalistic conglomerates - they also begin to choke out every form and aspect small business and or DIY --- anything ----.

What may seem like an insurmountable amount of money to a single inventor (say 300K) to patent and protect something, disseminate quickly into the hands of those who will put it to good use... may be a drop in the bucket, and a worthwhile philantropic investment, especially if it occurs collectively (5K ea. amongst 60 "investors"). 5K is a small price to pay to be a supporting global semaritan of needed, suppressable technology. If I had 5 million in the bank and I knew I could spend 5K of it on insuring that a million poor people in India could have fresh drinking water - inexpensively - at a fraction of previous costs... I'd jump on the chance to support that, you know?

I think we need to have a little faith that with the right structure, there are actually enough wealthy people on the planet that do give a ****.

Cheers

[RAMSET]

The less the merrier

I like whats behind Curtain #2
The 200.00 lets make it unpatentable forever!!
Is this truly Possible?


The 300K deal seems like it would take an act of Congress to pull off?

Unless the Mechanism has already been in the works for this?
Thx
Chet

[kcarring]

I agree fully, with "door #2", but I know of a few inventors that have been railroaded. Little will happen if the product becomes public domain, but unusable in the home due to lack of engineering, manufacturing, and or certifications. If something is truly needed, but requires engineering, UL certification, etc. then it is an entirely different situation, and as a friend of mine has learned, this is often where the railroading begins.

To give an example, take any game changing safety device. I have a friend who has invented a truly remarkable safety device. He holds the patents on it, and the engineering is done. The problem is; those governing agents who should be behind him are influenced by important corporates. For the safety board to "back him" is for the safety board to "cross them". For 2 years he won awards and was even given government grants for his invention, that will, if implemented save an average of 25 lives per year in Canada. This year the grants stopped, the recognition was denied, and he was even sent a letter of rejection for his grant continuation with the explanation claiming that he had, previously made "unfounded claims, and had misrepresented the product". Oddly, that couldn't be further from the truth, he had independant testing and studies done, and this year he had a pilot installation in a company of 750 people, with two official near-miss incident reports (in BC those are official and get sent to the government) citing the device as the saving factor.
The flip flop occurred because the manufacturers of the equipment that this device would be attached to, do not want the added cost of having to implement it in their design, and the safety council of BC likely does not want the added cost of working the device into safety legislation / policy.

The problem is, these "MIB" - are railroading his progress. 5 million later, his pool is running dry, his investors are anxious, and at this point, in his own words: "I'll likely get bought out, and the project will most likely be abolished by those not wishing to have the system mandated".

So let's take the same example but in energy. The UL has MIB influence and energy cartels do not need some up and comer rock their boat.

You have inventor A, and interested manufacturers B,C,D,E, and F. And philantropic investors G,H,I,J thru Z. You now have the power of the entire alphabet and all of it's pooled cash, AND lawyers to make SURE that the product goes to market.

To say that a game-changing global energy device that stands to free the planet can happen, cheaply, or discretely, or individually --- is a HUGE long shot. For example, will we really see Rossi's cold fusion home heater available at Home Depot? Allegedly he is trying to make that happen.

A collaborative, planned and strategic system is needed to beat the system, IMHO. As Aaron put it, you can have all the ducks in order, but at the end of the day, the only thing that will protect you is money and lawyers. Few inventors with their small(ish) investor pool would have the money and lawyers to "buck" the energy cartel, the DOE, UL, CSA, CE, etc. etc. all put together. You need to beat capitalism, with conglomerate socialism.

[RAMSET]

What resources do we have today in 2012?

KC
Is the infrastructure for your idea in place?
Links /Contacts?

THX
Chet
PS
Your a cool guy with great ideas ...I'm not trying to be difficult!

[Aaron]

provisional patent application

I like whats behind Curtain #2
The 200.00 lets make it unpatentable forever!!
Is this truly Possible?

Definitely possible - not just possible but it happens for every provisional application that expires in a year without filing for a non-provisional. Every invention on a provisional app goes into the public domain if it expires without getting a non-prov app.

Read this:
Provisional Application for Patent

When a provisional app expires, the invention becomes a prior art and is not patentable anymore.

Nolo is a very authoritative source for IP law - this is a very good document: http://nolonow.nolo.com/noe/popup/pr...tion_guide.pdf

This is a comment directly from the USPTO:

Claire:re: previous question from ROB / Expert 40 Regarding a 2nd filing of a second PPA to gain more time: isn't it the case that the contents of the original PPA will be made public after 18 months, and thus in the public domain?

Expert 40:Claire: Provisional patent applications are not published. However, if you file a non-provisional application that claims the benefit of the filing date of the provisional application, when the non-provisional application is published at 18 months from the filing date of the provisional application, the provisional application as originally filed may be provided to the public upon request (see 37 CFR 1.14(a)(1)(iv) – (vi).

That states that the APPLICATION is not in the public domain. But the invention in the provisional DOES become a prior art and if the application expires, that prior art can be used by anyone without permission and nobody can ever patent it.

So for the open source protection purposes, it appears that you could file the provisional - detail every single possible claim that you can with all details and publicly post the provisional application for public record - then just let it expire. Nobody will ever be able to patent it.

If you ever see a patent application (non provisional) published that is trying to make these claims - you can point out the provisional app with the filing date that precedes someone's else's application - and can probably block it from being approved without going to court.

I have had correspondence with the patent commissioner on a past issue. There are things you can do to file complaints of this type directly with the office of the commission of patents and from what I recall, this may be one of those situations.

With any claims, you won't be able to stop anyone from making a legitimate improvement, which they could then file. But if the provisional app of the original invention is useful to people and does what it needs to do, then who cares.

This is on: On Line Chat Transcripts

Typical government run around talk...

If a provisional application is filed and then after 12 months expires without filing a non-provisional application filed, does this prevent a patent ever to be issued?

No, the failure of you to file a non-provisional application within 12 months from the filing of your provisional application would not prevent you from obtaining a patent. However, if you do file your non-provisional application after the expiration of the 12 months time period you will not be entitled to the benefit of the earlier filing date of your provisional application and the examiner may use prior art with a date prior to the filing date of your non-provisional application to reject the claims in your non-provisional application.


---------------


First is says it won't prevent you from obtaining a patent. However, seems obvious that it will prevent the patent: "the examiner may use prior art with a date prior to the filing date of your non-provisional application to reject the claims in your non-provisional application."


When the provisional expires, it becomes "prior art" as I mentioned above with an earlier filing date. That means nobody can come along and patent it because the expired provisional made it a prior art with an earlier date - thus making it non patentable since you can't patent something that is already a "prior art".



----------------------
Provisional Application for Patent


"A provisional application automatically becomes abandoned when its pendency period expires 12 months after the provisional application filing date by operation of law"


A patent application may be expressly abandoned by filing a written declaration of abandonment identifying the application in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Express abandonment becomes effective when an appropriate official of the Office takes action thereon. Express abandonment of the application may not be recognized by the USPTO before the date of issue or publication unless it is actually received by appropriate officials in time to act. Abandonment may be either of the invention or of an application. An abandoned application, in accordance with 37 CFR 1.135 and 1.138, is one which is removed from the USPTO docket of pending applications.
-- see MPEP 711.01 for more


So basically, seems you can:


1. File the provisional -



2. Abandon the provisional - wait until it is filed and completed. Then submit a written declaration of abandonment for the provisional - this is "express abandonment", which clearly makes the abandonment intentional by the inventor. You don't have to wait for it to expire. But you might want to wait until it is actually filed and officially cataloged.



3. Post the provisional publicly together with a statement notarized or whatever by the inventor that the invention in the abandoned provisional is "prior art" that is free for anyone to use without restriction.


Nobody will ever be able to get a patent app on it. Even if someone makes an improvement and gets a patent, it doesn't matter because that can't stop anyone from making, using, selling or whatever they want with the original invention.


I discussed this with someone about 2 years ago - forgot all about it until Cherryman mentioned it.



But I think the above 3 steps protects an invention from being patented by anyone else and makes it available to open source without restriction. And, the patent office actually does NOT even investigate or look at the claims on a provisional app so it could be some OU device and and you just protected it and made it available for anyone and nobody else can patent it.prov


I think having to deal with a non-profit organization, etc... is an unnecessary step. Anyone can just do this for about $100 + some other minor fees possibly.


What do you all think? This is something I might consider doing with a few things myself.



THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE - just my free speech opinion.

[RAMSET]

Seems A good course of Action

This is how it works,Men [maybe a woman or two] of like mind
and like convictions ,find they have a problem............
They discuss it and find to their amazement they have solutions!!


Makes me very proud and very happy to be a part of this !

We are on the right path ......
How much info does there have to be in the application for this to be
Viable?

I was speaking with another Friend last night and he was saying some interesting things![about how far you should go when disclosing]
Perhaps I will ask him to Post here for some Clarity?
THX
Chet

[Aaron]

provisional patent application

Chet, for a provisional, there doesn't have to be that much disclosed.

But, if you want to keep anyone else from being able to patent the CLAIMS, which are the most important part of a patent, then you would want to spell out each and every claim possible as it relates to the invention.

If it is for open source, the more you disclose in the provisional, the better. It should be enough for anyone to actually replicate a working model - isn't that the goal you're seeking?

Then when you abandon the application, that invention becomes "prior art" and is no longer patentable so don't leave anything out that you don't want anyone to be able to patent - especially if you want people to be able to replicate it.

Current Fee Schedule

The provisional application fee is only $125 for "small entities".

[kcarring]

KC
Is the infrastructure for your idea in place?
Links /Contacts?

THX
Chet
PS
Your a cool guy with great ideas ...I'm not trying to be difficult!

No, purely a concept. Panacea does exist though and have the correct motives. Having said that though, I do know a couple of multi-millionaires who are very very interested in renewable resources, one of which - his father owned a large oil company (which sounds contradictory) and given a bunch of reasons, he does not invest any money into anything that is non renewable.

[kcarring]

What do you all think? This is something I might consider doing with a few things myself.

I think that is good news! I am going to look into this from a Canadian legal stand point.