Inventing The Telephone, Independently
from the historical-parallels dept
Ken E. writes "In light of the recent BlackBerry mess, an article about the history of the telephone with interesting historic parallels appeared yesterday at AmericanHeritage.com. Most of us know that Alexander Bell beat Elisha Gray to the patent office by mere hours to claim the patent for the telephone, but did you know that two other inventors can also claim the invention, including Thomas Edison? Similar disputes about independent invention and patent ownership can be found regarding the television, the airplane, and the automobile. Maybe it finally is time to legalize the independent invention defense."
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patents
*rolleyes*
i mean really. similar problems make for similar solutions. people shouldn't be rewarded/punished for being independantly intelligent, but not living next door to the patent office.
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Re: patents
Can u people please write your urls in proper format so I don't have to cut & paste?
Again, I apologize, I just had to ask.
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techdirt ignorance is amazing !!!
Have you ever checked a FREE on-line USPTO database where you can find full text for all issued patents and all patent applications (published at 18 months)
Just go to www.uspto.gov for Christ sake !
Once you are done with this little exercise, just shut up and never bring up the subject of "independent re-invention of patented or patent-pending invention" again...
And, by the way, US is still "first-to-invent" country, so all you need to do is to document your invention on a piece of paper and get it notarized, like Gordon Gould did...
or better yer, file a Provisional Patent application yourself without paying lawyers - it's just 100 bucks, so you can afford it, can't you ?
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Re: techdirt ignorance is amazing !!!
Why should independent inventors be forced to search the USPTO before inventing. Doesn't that seem inefficient?
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Re: techdirt ignorance is amazing !!!
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Re: angry dude reading comprehension is amazing !!
Second, as any patent searcher or patent lawyer will tell you, doing keyword searches in the USPTO database is not as straight-forward as you'd think. The USPTO itself regularly grants overlapping patents because the language of claims can be so different while describing the same thing.
Third, none of this is relevant anyway. If I have the natural right to discover, invent, and create, why should I allow the USPTO to restrict that right by forcing me to hire a lawyer to find out if (and how) someone else solved the same problem I'm trying to solve.
Finally, the fact that a subsequent inventor can hit on the same idea given the same problem space, *INDEPENDENTLY* (that means without knowledge of the first inventor or his invention, for angry dudes who don't understand the word), implies that the invention is obvious to one skilled in the art, and thus the patent is invalid anyway.
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Re: techdirt ignorance is amazing !!!
Also your "look it up" idea requires net access and does not address the fact that some people can not afford the system. They would have to travel(expense/time)to look themselves, or submit with blind hope(losing the $100 if they were outrun), or have someone search(hope they don't miss anything or take too long), showing yet another flaw you do not wish to see.
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Constitution
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No Subject Given
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Re: angry dude reading comprehension is amazing !!
You are positively an idiot...
You can discover, invent, re-invent, and create until you
get sick of it, but you are not allowed to profit from somebody else's earlier documented invention without inventor's permission , that's all...
If you can think about it a little bit (which I doubt) you will come to the conclusion that this is the way it should be...
Any other way would be grossly unfair to original creators.
Patents are all about the right to make money from new inventions, not about your right to create...
(US patent law is kind of restrictive, but in practise no patent holder goes after the researchers or end users of unlicensed patented tech, only after the manufacturers making large profits...)
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Re: Constitution
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Re: No Subject Given
The market place already decides who's invention is better..
Patent only decides who profits from those inventions, some corporate piece of shit or you, the original inventor and patent holder.
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Re: angry dude reading comprehension is amazing !!
You also seem to like to throw around claims without supporting them.
For example: "this is the way it should be."
Why?
Also, we've gone over this repeatedly, but you continue to focus on patents being a right to make money. That's false. Patents are solely for the sake of promotion the progress of useful sciences...
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Re: angry dude reading comprehension is amazing !!
> Patents are all about the right to make money from
> new inventions, not about your right to create...
> (US patent law is kind of restrictive, but in
> practise no patent holder goes after the
> researchers or end users of unlicensed patented
> tech, only after the manufacturers making large
> profits...)
Care to explain to me, then, why I received a cease-and-desist from a patent holder over a not-for-profit, academic-only website I put up a couple of years ago?
You can call people an idiot all you want, but that doesn't change the essential facts. Patents are a right to exclude EVERYONE from practicing the claims, whether for profit or not.
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Re: Constitution
"Section. 8. The Congress shall have Power ...
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
http://www.constitution.org/constit_.htm
So if the Patent law, on balance, is not promoting the "progress of science and the useful arts" it may not be constitutionally valid.
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Re: Constitution
[Congress has the right:]
"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
[to angry dude:] too bad that big companies make you sign away rights to any thoughts that occur to you while working for them. So it's a fat lot of good that a patent does the actual inventor.
-Raj[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Constitution
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No Subject Given
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Re: angry dude reading comprehension is amazing !!
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