Patents

[causearuckus]

Me and my friends were talking at lunch and started talking about patents. Is the concept of the patent patented?

 

[Juice Box]

^^ yes, we were just talking about this, and I am curious as well... however I dont think the idea itself needs its own patent

 

[Kyteland]

No it is not patented, but you couldn't patent the idea either.

 

[HomeBrewerDude]

how about if you trademark the term "patent"?

kind of like how MS copyrighted the letter "e" a few years ago.

 

[causearuckus]

Why wouldnt you be able to patent the idea?

 

[Juice Box]

Originally posted by: HomeBrewerDude
how about if you trademark the term "patent"?

kind of like how MS copyrighted the letter "e" a few years ago.

why did they do this?

 

[Kyteland]

Originally posted by: causearuckus
Why wouldnt you be able to patent the idea?

Do you really want to know?

First of all a patent can only be enforced if there is some organization with the power to enforce it. This is why a patent in the US does no good in other countries. Each country has its own patent office and you must protect your idea in each applicable country by going through their system. This is why you will see stuff appear in Russia even though a US corporation has a patent. If two different agencies don't have some kind of agreement there is nothing you can do to stop someone in another country from taking your idea.

So lets say I did originally come up with the idea for patenting things and the first thing I patented was the patent. What's to stop someone in Japan or Russia or even my next door neighbor from starting their own patent office? Should I tell my mommy on them? Write them a scathing letter? Yeah right. Without the legal system behind you there is nothing you can do.

Secondly If I went through all of the old patents today and said "Hey, nobody patented patents. Score!" and then tried to patent it today it would be rejected due to prior art clauses. Prior art basically means that what you are trying to patent has already been done by someone else and is already common knowledge. It would be like me trying to patent the printing press, or the English language. There are rules set up specifically to prevent you from doing that. And if for some reason you do get a patent approved for something stupid like that, anyone can take it to court and get it invalidated.

So, in short, you can't patent patents.

 

[iamwiz82]

Originally posted by: causearuckus
Me and my friends were talking at lunch and started talking about patents. Is the concept of the patent patented?

Sounds like a rip-roaring conversation. I bet the local Wizards of the Coast was abuzz with this topic.

 

[HomeBrewerDude]

Originally posted by: digitalsnare

Originally posted by: HomeBrewerDude
how about if you trademark the term "patent"?

kind of like how MS copyrighted the letter "e" a few years ago.

why did they do this?

because they could.

this message cost me 56 cents in license fees ($.02/e) :disgust::|