My patents

A long time ago in a land far, far away, I worked on some projects from which some colleagues and I applied for a couple of patents.  We were doing some pretty cool software development and had the opportunity to be officially labelled as  “inventors”.

The most recent patent was just awarded last week and I have since been inundated with mail from companies ready and willing to help me bring my new invention to market.  Though I am very appreciative of these folks trying to take a cut of whatever money I might make from it, I would prefer that they stop sending me mail.  They say, “hurry, you need to get <insert your invention here> to market as soon as possible!”

The funny thing is that it has taken four and a half years for this most recent patent to be awarded.  I wonder how many things are out there that could be saving lives or cleaning up oil spills, etc that are stuck in the big patent machine.  There are tons of silly patents and mean patents and patents that will have a profound impact on people’s lives.  I can’t imagine patenting human genes (which is quite a scary mess).  Seeds are patented and patent owners may do all sorts of evil enforcing those patents.

My patents are not evil and will not ever make me a single cent but I often wonder why some patents are awarded and who in the world thinks it is ok to patent some stuff. I am pretty proud to have been awarded these patents but I can’t imagine being so proud of a bit of work I might do that I would be willing to withhold treatment for someone’s illness because I own a patent on some gene. I cannot imagine forcing third-world farmers to buy my genetically modified seed (or suing them if their seed crosses with someone else’s seed for which I owned a patent).  I just can’t imagine!

I guess I am rambling as usual…of course, maybe if I owned a patent on a gene, I could afford to buy one of the plaques that the aforementioned “take your product to market” companies was selling and I might actually have something to take a picture of so I could do a proper picture-filled post. Until then, I will be content with having my name buried in the records of the US patent office.

By the way, if anyone is interested in tattooing my patent numbers on their bodies, I am willing to sell the rights to the numbers for a small fee…

(oh yeah, none of the pics are my patents…though I wish!)

8 thoughts on “My patents

  1. And there I’d thought you’d invented the lawnmower tricycle! :>) I coincidentally work in IP law (not an attorney, I’m an assistant to one) and so this post was especially interesting to me. Congratulations, Mr. Inventor. :>)

    Yes, some patents take years to issue. The average time to first examination is 2 years, depending on the art unit and how overloaded they are. I do order patent plaques from time to time for a client, but have no idea how much they cost individually.

    You have printed out your patent(s), havent’ you? If you e-mail me with the patent nos. I can send them pdf to you (they are free, so no charge from me).

    Having issued patents is something to crow about! Cheers and Congratulations ~ Conny
    .-= Conny´s last blog ..KinderGardens – Week 6 =-.

  2. Yeah, it gave me some bragging rights with my bro. I told him that I was an inventor now and that I could invent him something if the need arises.

    But it is still something to be proud of and looks nice on your resume. Congrats!

  3. Congrats on the patents. LOL on the pics! Let me guess. Instead of the lawnmower trike you’ve invented the bee energy generated lawn mower? Which incidentally fills in ant, gopher, and snake holes along the way with honey. Waaaay superior to the lawnmower trike, of course.
    .-= Lisa´s last blog ..Feeling Lucky =-.

  4. Natalie – I have never seen the book…but I will have to take a look…stuff like that cracks me up!

    Conny – I will take you up on that offer. I didn’t know when this all started that I would have to pay for copies of my patent if I wanted the official documents. I mean, I could see it if I wanted a hard copy sent to me, but paying for a pdf? Sounds crazy…and not cheap! Anyhow, I will send you an email…thanks a ton!

    Capri Kel – and my mom thought I would never amount to anything!

    Lisa – if I could come up with a bee invention, I would be thrilled…wouldn’t make any money probably but I would love the be in the books!

  5. Warren,
    This may be a little late but I’ve found myself become very interested in the patents on older tools that I own after I stumbled across the us patent site. I’ve now found multiple patent resources and between them you are easily able to save images or the entire patent in pdf for yourself for free.

    Official US Patent Office search site. This will charge you to get a pdf but I’ve found that using ‘Quicktime Alternative’ (http://download.cnet.com/QuickTime-Alternative/3000-2139_4-10633500.html) instead of ‘quicktime’, it allows me to save everything as images from the screen.

    http://patft.uspto.gov/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.htm

    Here’s a free site that gives you many different information lookup options depending on what info you know about the patent.

    http://www.freepatentsonline.com/search.html

    Google now has their own patent search and after you’ve located it you have the option of free pdf download. By far what I’ve used the most although have used the other links some to decipher what a ‘patent pend’ or ‘patent applied for’ had turned into.

    http://www.google.com/patents

    It’s odd but I have a few items that have stamped ‘patent applied’ but have had no luck in locating the patent or application on any search.

    Particularly a tool that was made here in Indiana by a company called Sprunger Bros. (http://www.owwm.com/mfgindex/detail.aspx?id=786)

    I hope this info helps you or someone else out there.

    Jeremy

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