I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)

"Tom Gardner" wrote:

I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

It must have been at least a decade or longer ago that I read about this gent winning his
case in the Detroit Free Press. Guy was tenacious.

Wes

On Sep 24, 6:28*pm, "Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent wipers
in '63. *Think how things have changed in 45 years. *Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. *True, they didn't have
555s in '63. *So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. *In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. *Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)

Tom:
Any good (product) idea takes a commitment of time, smarts and money
to bring it to market and then do the right things that make it
successful (profitable). Those people with the balls to risk their own
personal funds, stay up late nights overcoming problems and plain just
won't take no for an answer are the ones that make it. There are also
a lot of people who did all the right things, built great products and
still failed. In my opinion, ideas are a dime a dozen. An idea is
nothing without the ability (taking the $ risk, generating the
commitment) to fund it, make it and sell it.
-Mike

"mlcorson" wrote in message
...
On Sep 24, 6:28 pm, "Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and
have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)

Tom:
Any good (product) idea takes a commitment of time, smarts and money
to bring it to market and then do the right things that make it
successful (profitable). Those people with the balls to risk their own
personal funds, stay up late nights overcoming problems and plain just
won't take no for an answer are the ones that make it. There are also
a lot of people who did all the right things, built great products and
still failed. In my opinion, ideas are a dime a dozen. An idea is
nothing without the ability (taking the $ risk, generating the
commitment) to fund it, make it and sell it.
-Mike

Excellent reply! Also, those with the "hook" into a market search for ideas
for products that can be shoved into the existing pipe. That "pipe" is a
valuable commodity!

On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 19:28:33 -0400, "Tom Gardner"
wrote:

I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)


Jerome H. Lemelson

Sunworshipper wrote in message
...
On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 19:28:33 -0400, "Tom Gardner"
wrote:

I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and
have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than
the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie,
it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick.
Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)


Jerome H. Lemelson

Edison had more inventions but he had squads of people doing a lot of the
work while old Tom took all the credit.

On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 20:48:28 -0400, the infamous "Tom Gardner"
scrolled the following:

Edison had more inventions but he had squads of people doing a lot of the
work while old Tom took all the credit.

Bill Gates could be considered a more modern rendition of Edison
style.

--
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.
-- George Bernard Shaw

Larry Jaques wrote:

On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 20:48:28 -0400, the infamous "Tom Gardner"
scrolled the following:

Edison had more inventions but he had squads of people doing a lot of the
work while old Tom took all the credit.

Bill Gates could be considered a more modern rendition of Edison
style.


Except for the fact that Edison scrapped his bad ideas.



--
http://improve-usenet.org/index.html

aioe.org, Goggle Groups, and Web TV users must request to be white
listed, or I will not see your messages.

If you have broadband, your ISP may have a NNTP news server included in
your account: http://www.usenettools.net/ISP.htm


There are two kinds of people on this earth:
The crazy, and the insane.
The first sign of insanity is denying that you're crazy.

"Michael A. Terrell" wrote:

Except for the fact that Edison scrapped his bad ideas.

I thought Geo. Westinghouse using Telsa's ideas scrapped Edisons bad ideas.

Wes

On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 19:28:33 -0400, "Tom Gardner"
wrote:

I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!

It doesn't work that way. Ya give 'em books, they eat the covers.
Been there, done that, had a lot of fun along the way. Won a buncha
patents though I don't own any nor care to. Idea guys find their own
happiness. A need to be revered is a sure route to frustration.

"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a
system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True,
they didn't have 555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more
important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the
movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me
sick. Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys need
to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any,
original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers got
screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. My reaction then,
and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought that one
up.

Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was no
inventor at all. He had one idea in his life, and expected to get rich
from it. Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that one. Yes,
some people are much better than others at creating good original ideas,
but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical at the time you find
it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys didn't think it up at the
same time. Dreaming up new ideas is easy. Finding new solutions which are
practical is not so easy. That requires a lot of research and
investigation to understand what will be needed, and at which point in time
it will become practical. And then creating a design that works, and is
affordable for the application.

At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to find
out. But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over inflated
ego. I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I also don't
think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his "invention"
(from what I understand of it).

I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of the
old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and standing up
for himself" angle. I only wish it was over something more significant
than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.

--
Curt Welch http://CurtWelch.Com/
http://NewsReader.Com/

On 26 Sep 2008 04:38:39 GMT, (Curt Welch) wrote:

"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a
system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True,
they didn't have 555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more
important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the
movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me
sick. Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys need
to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any,
original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers got
screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. My reaction then,
and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought that one
up.

Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was no
inventor at all. He had one idea in his life, and expected to get rich
from it. Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that one. Yes,
some people are much better than others at creating good original ideas,
but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical at the time you find
it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys didn't think it up at the
same time. Dreaming up new ideas is easy. Finding new solutions which are
practical is not so easy. That requires a lot of research and
investigation to understand what will be needed, and at which point in time
it will become practical. And then creating a design that works, and is
affordable for the application.

At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to find
out. But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over inflated
ego. I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I also don't
think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his "invention"
(from what I understand of it).

I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of the
old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and standing up
for himself" angle. I only wish it was over something more significant
than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.


Yeah,

Real genius would have been to make the wipers pause at the top of
their stroke too. Using those Teflon blades with my intermittent
wipers is TERRIBLE. The freaking blades wipe the glass so clean,
they cause an almost "fingernails-on-the-blackboard" screech on the
backstroke so bad I have to hope for MORE rain.

Take care.

Brian Lawson,
Bothwell, Ontario.

ps....I hear the garbage truck outside right now. THAT was real
genius!!

Brian Lawson wrote:

Using those Teflon blades with my intermittent
wipers is TERRIBLE. The freaking blades wipe the glass so clean,
they cause an almost "fingernails-on-the-blackboard" screech on the
backstroke so bad I have to hope for MORE rain.

Rainx, to heck with the wipers.

Wes

"Wes" wrote in message
...
Brian Lawson wrote:

Using those Teflon blades with my intermittent
wipers is TERRIBLE. The freaking blades wipe the glass so clean,
they cause an almost "fingernails-on-the-blackboard" screech on the
backstroke so bad I have to hope for MORE rain.

Rainx, to heck with the wipers.

Wes

I'll second that! It's great stuff, pity it doesn't last longer before it
needs re-doing.

On Sat, 27 Sep 2008 17:21:35 +0800, the infamous "Den"
scrawled the following:



"Wes" wrote in message
...
Brian Lawson wrote:

Using those Teflon blades with my intermittent
wipers is TERRIBLE. The freaking blades wipe the glass so clean,
they cause an almost "fingernails-on-the-blackboard" screech on the
backstroke so bad I have to hope for MORE rain.

Rainx, to heck with the wipers.

Wes

I'll second that! It's great stuff,

I'll third that!


pity it doesn't last longer before it
needs re-doing.

I do my windshield about 3 times a year, but only do the side and rear
windows once. Initial application takes about half an hour, to clean
the windows and RainX 'em. Redoing the windshield takes five minutes.

Does anyone use FogX inside? How does it fare?

--
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.
-- George Bernard Shaw

"Den" wrote:

I'll second that! It's great stuff, pity it doesn't last longer before it
needs re-doing.

I bought some windshield wiper fluid once with rainx in it. That worked really well.

Wes

On Sep 26, 12:38*am, (Curt Welch) wrote:
"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. *Think how things have changed in 45 years. *Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a
system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the day. *True,
they didn't have 555s in '63. *So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more
important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. *In the
movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me
sick. *Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys need
to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any,
original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers got
screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. *My reaction then,
and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought that one
up.

Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was no
inventor at all. *He had one idea in his life, and expected to get rich
from it. *Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that one. *Yes,
some people are much better than others at creating good original ideas,
but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical at the time you find
it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys didn't think it up at the
same time. *Dreaming up new ideas is easy. *Finding new solutions which are
practical is not so easy. *That requires a lot of research and
investigation to understand what will be needed, and at which point in time
it will become practical. *And then creating a design that works, and is
affordable for the application.

At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to find
out. *But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over inflated
ego. *I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I also don't
think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his "invention"
(from what I understand of it).

I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of the
old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and standing up
for himself" angle. *I only wish it was over something more significant
than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.

--
Curt Welch * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *http://CurtWelch.Com/
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *http://NewsReader.Com/

SR-71 and intermittent wipers are two different types of ideas.

What could any one guy on the SR71 team, any of 'em, have done by
themselves?

Little ideas count too.
I had a microwave that had one damn nice feature.
Most microwave turntables, the dish spins at some rate that just seems
reasonable.
Now, most things you nuke go in for a time that's a multiple of ten
seconds.
Spin that platter at any old rate, and the mug you put in is now hot,
and the handle is pointing any old way, and chances are good you have
to grab the hot mug, or bend over and reach over the steam.
Now, spin that platter at 1 revolution per 10 seconds, and that handle
is right where you put it.

Genius!


Dave

wrote:

Spin that platter at any old rate, and the mug you put in is now hot,
and the handle is pointing any old way, and chances are good you have
to grab the hot mug, or bend over and reach over the steam.
Now, spin that platter at 1 revolution per 10 seconds, and that handle
is right where you put it.

Another thought is on low power cycles where the power is cycled on and off, where is that
platter (and dinner) in relation to power on cycles?

Wes
--
"Additionally as a security officer, I carry a gun to protect
government officials but my life isn't worth protecting at home
in their eyes." Dick Anthony Heller

On 26 Sep 2008 04:38:39 GMT, the infamous (Curt Welch)
scrawled the following:

"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a
system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True,
they didn't have 555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more
important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the
movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me
sick. Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys need
to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any,
original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers got
screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. My reaction then,
and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought that one
up.

How's the air up there, Curt? Pretty thin?


Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was no
inventor at all. He had one idea in his life, and expected to get rich
from it. Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that one. Yes,
some people are much better than others at creating good original ideas,
but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical at the time you find
it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys didn't think it up at the
same time. Dreaming up new ideas is easy. Finding new solutions which are
practical is not so easy. That requires a lot of research and
investigation to understand what will be needed, and at which point in time
it will become practical. And then creating a design that works, and is
affordable for the application.

So, what petty idea was stolen from you to get you so vitriolic?


At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.


Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to find
out. But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over inflated
ego. I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I also don't
think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his "invention"
(from what I understand of it).

I haven't yet seen the movie, but to hear you rant like this without
having seen it is quite interesting. Tell us the real story behind
your acrid response, sir.


I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of the
old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and standing up
for himself" angle. I only wish it was over something more significant
than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.

Just -try- to tell me that you've never used them, Curt.

--
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.
-- George Bernard Shaw

On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 06:54:44 -0700, Larry Jaques
wrote:



At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.

It's always been thus at many or most large companies: in the "fine
print" of the job application, it says that anything one thinks of, on
or off the job, belongs to the company. In practice, that only
applies to ideas relevant to the company's business: companies don't
go after a guy who designs engines during the day and invents new
fishing lures hoops nights and weekends.

My employer paid $1 for each patent filed back in the day. That was
later increased to $1500 per patent.

I never knew an engineer or scientist who felt shorted by this
approach. Engineers are paid to innovate and invent. It's part of
their job.
It's not an explicit job requirement, but those who do are usually
better compensated and have more interesting assignments than those
who don't.

Some feel that "the idea" is gold. In fact, there's a lot of work and
investment involved in getting from "idea" to profit. If ya wanna be
an inventor/entrepeneur, ya gotta do the whole job or get others to do
for you. Many or most engineers don't want to mess with the many
tedious and mundane aspects (and risks) of taking an idea from eureka
to market success.

"Don Foreman" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 06:54:44 -0700, Larry Jaques
wrote:



At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none
of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.

It's always been thus at many or most large companies: in the "fine
print" of the job application, it says that anything one thinks of, on
or off the job, belongs to the company. In practice, that only
applies to ideas relevant to the company's business: companies don't
go after a guy who designs engines during the day and invents new
fishing lures hoops nights and weekends.

My employer paid $1 for each patent filed back in the day. That was
later increased to $1500 per patent.

I never knew an engineer or scientist who felt shorted by this
approach. Engineers are paid to innovate and invent. It's part of
their job.
It's not an explicit job requirement, but those who do are usually
better compensated and have more interesting assignments than those
who don't.

Some feel that "the idea" is gold. In fact, there's a lot of work and
investment involved in getting from "idea" to profit. If ya wanna be
an inventor/entrepeneur, ya gotta do the whole job or get others to do
for you. Many or most engineers don't want to mess with the many
tedious and mundane aspects (and risks) of taking an idea from eureka
to market success.

I'll never get another patent! Too expensive and the Russians ripped me
off!

Don Foreman wrote:
On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 06:54:44 -0700, Larry Jaques
wrote:


At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.
True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.

It's always been thus at many or most large companies: in the "fine
print" of the job application, it says that anything one thinks of, on
or off the job, belongs to the company. In practice, that only
applies to ideas relevant to the company's business: companies don't
go after a guy who designs engines during the day and invents new
fishing lures hoops nights and weekends.

My employer paid $1 for each patent filed back in the day. That was
later increased to $1500 per patent.

I never knew an engineer or scientist who felt shorted by this
approach. Engineers are paid to innovate and invent. It's part of
their job.

My employer paid $500 or $1k and I never felt shorted during the
process, but 5 years later when the subpoena to defend the a patent that
had been sold to a bunch of litigous trolls showed up 4 days before
Christmas, I was way less than pleased. After spending a couple of days
preparing and giving deposition, I felt distinctly screwed on that $500
or $1k.

Filing patents for your employer is a lot like signing up for the
military in peacetime for their college benefits. You may get what you
expected, but you may wind up getting a completely different education,
at a time you did not expect.

BobH

On Sun, 28 Sep 2008 03:30:39 GMT, BobH
wrote:


My employer paid $500 or $1k and I never felt shorted during the
process, but 5 years later when the subpoena to defend the a patent that
had been sold to a bunch of litigous trolls showed up 4 days before
Christmas, I was way less than pleased. After spending a couple of days
preparing and giving deposition, I felt distinctly screwed on that $500
or $1k.

Why? The $500 or $1K was an "award" or honorarium for assigning
rights to said to your employer. Defending it is then his problem. If
he needs your help, he should pay for your time and services like he
does for any other time and services.

Filing patents for your employer is a lot like signing up for the
military in peacetime for their college benefits. You may get what you
expected, but you may wind up getting a completely different education,
at a time you did not expect.

I'm seeing more gimmewhine than professional here. Signing with the
military in peacetime or anytime conveys obligations as well as
benefits. Well duh! The military does not exist primarily to provide
college benefits. It exists to defend the nation against enemies
foreign and domestic. There is never a guarantee that there won't be
any enemies around during your service period. Pick yer pony, take
yer ride.

If your employer wants your professional services to help defend his
patent, fine. If he doesn't, that's his choice.

Part of being a professional is being ready to move at any time. The
alternative is becoming an indentured servant in exchange for an
illusion of security. Having to move can certaintly be very
inconvenient and expensive. In my case, clear willingness to do it
if and when necessary always made it unnecessary.

It would take singularly stupid management to **** off their most
prolific inventors, but there's no shortage of stupid management and
that does seem to be getting worse. My experience is dated, having
been retired for 9 years now.

Larry Jaques wrote:

On 26 Sep 2008 04:38:39 GMT, the infamous (Curt Welch)
scrawled the following:

"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a
system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True,
they didn't have 555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more
important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the
movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me
sick. Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys need
to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any,
original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers got
screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. My reaction then,
and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought that one
up.

How's the air up there, Curt? Pretty thin?

Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was no
inventor at all. He had one idea in his life, and expected to get rich
from it. Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that one. Yes,
some people are much better than others at creating good original ideas,
but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical at the time you find
it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys didn't think it up at the
same time. Dreaming up new ideas is easy. Finding new solutions which are
practical is not so easy. That requires a lot of research and
investigation to understand what will be needed, and at which point in time
it will become practical. And then creating a design that works, and is
affordable for the application.

So, what petty idea was stolen from you to get you so vitriolic?

At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.

Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to find
out. But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over inflated
ego. I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I also don't
think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his "invention"
(from what I understand of it).

I haven't yet seen the movie, but to hear you rant like this without
having seen it is quite interesting. Tell us the real story behind
your acrid response, sir.

I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of the
old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and standing up
for himself" angle. I only wish it was over something more significant
than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.

Just -try- to tell me that you've never used them, Curt.

My inflation adjusted $0.75...

On the subject of intermittent windshield wipers and patents, one of the
requirements for issuing a patent is supposed to be that the invention
is not obvious to someone in the field.

People in the automotive engineering field drive automobiles, and anyone
driving an automobile before / without intermittent windshield wipers
was already manually operating them in an intermittent fashion under
light rain conditions.

Based on that existing knowledge, automating the intermittent function
would indeed be obvious and therefore a patent for such would be invalid
whether issued to an independent inventor or an automobile manufacturer.

Pete C.

Pete C. wrote:

Based on that existing knowledge, automating the intermittent function
would indeed be obvious and therefore a patent for such would be invalid
whether issued to an independent inventor or an automobile manufacturer.

As useless as it was before, I now see that there is *no* reason
for a Patent Office, even for large companies. We can close it.

Until then, we can retroactively invalidate any patent claim
by simply saying "Well, I see it's just obvious that you would
invent this particular kind of assembly robot with these particular
features operated in this particular way."

Genius is recognizing the obvious before everyone else.
It should be rewarded.

--Winston

Winston wrote:

Pete C. wrote:

Based on that existing knowledge, automating the intermittent function
would indeed be obvious and therefore a patent for such would be invalid
whether issued to an independent inventor or an automobile manufacturer.

As useless as it was before, I now see that there is *no* reason
for a Patent Office, even for large companies. We can close it.

Until then, we can retroactively invalidate any patent claim
by simply saying "Well, I see it's just obvious that you would
invent this particular kind of assembly robot with these particular
features operated in this particular way."

Genius is recognizing the obvious before everyone else.
It should be rewarded.

--Winston

Inventing a practical electric light - Genius
Inventing the telephone - Genius
Applying a timer to windshield wipers to do what people were already
doing manually - Obvious

Winston wrote:
Pete C. wrote:

Based on that existing knowledge, automating the intermittent function
would indeed be obvious and therefore a patent for such would be
invalid whether issued to an independent inventor or an automobile
manufacturer.

As useless as it was before, I now see that there is *no* reason
for a Patent Office, even for large companies. We can close it.

Until then, we can retroactively invalidate any patent claim
by simply saying "Well, I see it's just obvious that you would
invent this particular kind of assembly robot with these particular
features operated in this particular way."

Genius is recognizing the obvious before everyone else.
It should be rewarded.

--Winston

Yeah, I agree 100% with your statement about Genius. But I'm quickly
approaching the belief that the patent office and intellectual property
laws might be doing more damage than good in this age. Copyright and
trademark registration is fine, but when we try to patent inventions, the
claims start to become too abstract and to far reaching at which time the
patents stop working for us by protecting R&D investments and work against
us by creating nothing more than intellectual property squatters and
speculators trying to out guess the markets and benefit from a gamble that
has zero social value. If they are right, they get free money for making a
guess that has no benefit to society other than in making them richer. If
they are wrong they lose, but society also loses because resources are
wasted on registering patents that have no social value.

Most the payback companies receive from being the first to invent something
comes from the fact that they get to be first to market. No matter how
fast the competition is, there's always a delay as the competition reverse
engineers and tries to catch up which gives the guy first to market a short
term monopoly which is their reward for doing the research and for
investing their research dollars in the right place, at the right time.
First to market advantage alone with trade secrete production offers most
of the good of the patent system with zero overhead and cost and with none
of the bad side effects that the patent system creates. It's hard to
evaluate all the costs, but patents are looking questionable to me.

--
Curt Welch http://CurtWelch.Com/
http://NewsReader.Com/

On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 12:33:15 -0500, "Pete C."
wrote:


Larry Jaques wrote:

On 26 Sep 2008 04:38:39 GMT, the infamous (Curt Welch)
scrawled the following:

"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a
system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True,
they didn't have 555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more
important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the
movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me
sick. Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys need
to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any,
original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers got
screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. My reaction then,
and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought that one
up.

How's the air up there, Curt? Pretty thin?

Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was no
inventor at all. He had one idea in his life, and expected to get rich
from it. Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that one. Yes,
some people are much better than others at creating good original ideas,
but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical at the time you find
it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys didn't think it up at the
same time. Dreaming up new ideas is easy. Finding new solutions which are
practical is not so easy. That requires a lot of research and
investigation to understand what will be needed, and at which point in time
it will become practical. And then creating a design that works, and is
affordable for the application.

So, what petty idea was stolen from you to get you so vitriolic?

At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none of
the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.

Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to find
out. But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over inflated
ego. I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I also don't
think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his "invention"
(from what I understand of it).

I haven't yet seen the movie, but to hear you rant like this without
having seen it is quite interesting. Tell us the real story behind
your acrid response, sir.

I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of the
old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and standing up
for himself" angle. I only wish it was over something more significant
than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.

Just -try- to tell me that you've never used them, Curt.

My inflation adjusted $0.75...

On the subject of intermittent windshield wipers and patents, one of the
requirements for issuing a patent is supposed to be that the invention
is not obvious to someone in the field.

People in the automotive engineering field drive automobiles, and anyone
driving an automobile before / without intermittent windshield wipers
was already manually operating them in an intermittent fashion under
light rain conditions.

Based on that existing knowledge, automating the intermittent function
would indeed be obvious and therefore a patent for such would be invalid
whether issued to an independent inventor or an automobile manufacturer.

Pete C.


Not quite. The IDEA was obvious - the implementation was not.

Hoewever, I think I had mine working about the same time - My Mini had
Lucas wipers and switches. Intermittent, but not totally predictable
(kinda like a FORD)
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **

On Fri, 26 Sep 2008 15:04:51 -0400, clare at snyder dot ontario dot
canada wrote:


Hoewever, I think I had mine working about the same time - My Mini had
Lucas wipers and switches. Intermittent, but not totally predictable
(kinda like a FORD)
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **
My Lumina APV started having intermittent everything at about thirteen
years of age (not a puberty thing), one of the problems of composite
body construction, ended up running a lot of ground wires.
Gerry :-)}
London, Canada

Larry Jaques wrote:
On 26 Sep 2008 04:38:39 GMT, the infamous (Curt Welch)
scrawled the following:

"Tom Gardner" wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a
manager at a design firm would tell a group of engineers to design
such a system and have several designs on his desk by the end of the
day. True, they didn't have 555s in '63. So, is it that a unique
idea is a lot more important than the actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that
lead to designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In
the movie, it looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes
me sick. Designers and model builders need more respect but idea guys
need to be revered! (coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if
any, original ideas)

I remember hearing about how the guy who invented intermediate wipers
got screwed by the auto companies maybe 20 or 30 years ago. My reaction
then, and pretty much my reaction now is - any idiot could have thought
that one up.

How's the air up there, Curt? Pretty thin?

Whey I see something like that, my thought is that this "inventor" was
no inventor at all. He had one idea in his life, and expected to get
rich from it. Real inventors create 10 ideas a day better than that
one. Yes, some people are much better than others at creating good
original ideas, but what's hard, is finding the one which is practical
at the time you find it, and which isn't so obvious that 10 other guys
didn't think it up at the same time. Dreaming up new ideas is easy.
Finding new solutions which are practical is not so easy. That requires
a lot of research and investigation to understand what will be needed,
and at which point in time it will become practical. And then creating
a design that works, and is affordable for the application.

So, what petty idea was stolen from you to get you so vitriolic?

I've invented 100's of things in my life. It's what most good engineers do
just as part of their job. Nothing has been stolen from me.

At the same time this guy made the invention of his life - a timer to
control a motor, real inventors and creative engineers were at work
creating the SR-71 blackbird - something so advance and creative it
probably included a 1000 items more noteworthy than this timer, and none
of the engineers creating all those inventions every day expected to get
anything in return except another day's pay.

True, with the type of contracts they have to sign to get work
nowadays. That's truly sad, too. The better companies share the
wealth and/or fame with their more inspired workers. THAT is the way
it should be, at least in most instances.

Now maybe there's more to this story and I'd like to see the movie to
find out. But mostly, I think the inventor probably had a greatly over
inflated ego. I don't doubt the auto companies ripped him off, but I
also don't think he deserved much more than about a day's pay for his
"invention" (from what I understand of it).

I haven't yet seen the movie, but to hear you rant like this without
having seen it is quite interesting. Tell us the real story behind
your acrid response, sir.

It's not the movie I'm ranting about. It's the idea that something so
trivial would be given so much attention and that the guy who says he
"invented it" felt he deserved so much for so little.

However, I just saw a longer trailer for the movie today which implied all
the auto companies were "working on the problem" at the time, and this guy
came up with some unique solution. I really don't have the faintest idea
why this was a hard problem to solve, but maybe there was something to it I
just don't yet know. Even without power electronics to control the motor
you just activate each cycle with a relay that included an R/C delay
circuit and a transitor to drive the relay. If the transistor wasn't
viable because of cost or reliability in 1962, use a small timer motor
which has cam closing the contacts to activate each cycle. This is trivial
stuff for 1960.

The idea that the such a device would be useful is likewise trivial. When
you find yourself having to turn the wipers on and off every few seconds
because of a light drizzle, it becomes obvious almost instantly to any good
inventor that the car should be turning it on and off for you. The only
question about this invention (which is the real question about 99% of all
inventions) is at which point does the market develop for it. That is,
when does it become cheap enough, and reliable enough, that the customer
will be willing to pay what it costs to be included? But that is not an
engineering question, it's just standard marketing question answered by a
little bit of insight combined with market research. It's just normal day
to day engineering and development work.

There are engineering ideas that are once in a life time types of
inventions that deserve special attention and wealth to the creator. And
maybe, there is something about this guy's solution that deserves such
attention. I just don't see it yet. I will no doubt see the move when it
comes out (I see most the big movies) so I'll find out if if there is
something I'm failing to understand when I see it.

I think mostly, the movie is just an attempt to leverage the appeal of
the old theme of "little guy being screwed by large corporation and
standing up for himself" angle. I only wish it was over something more
significant than the "invention" of interment windshield wipers.

Just -try- to tell me that you've never used them, Curt.

I use them all the time. They are extremely useful. But it wasn't a big
invention that resulted from a stroke of genus. They come under the
classification of stuff I consider obvious. I'm not sure (it was a long
time ago and I was in grade school), but I'm fairly sure it's one of the
millions of things I thought up before I heard they existed. It's just
obvious engineering.

Some things that I didn't think up and which are really cool, include the
invention of the www. I was working in that area, and knew about all the
issues, and problems, but yet, the particular combination of a text server
with embedded hyper link tags in the pages to allow for embedded click-able
links in the pages was a stroke of genus. I'd played with the Mac
hypercard application, and I'd used ftp servers and gopher and the like to
find data on the internet. And I even personally owned a NeXT at the time
the www was invented on a NeXT and I had written internet server
applications. But it never occurred to me to put those technologies
together in that combination. But, it was one of those things that 30
seconds after looking at it, you instantly knew you are looking at
something that is going to change the world.

There are many inventions like that which are just so much thinking out of
the box, and so cool, and so simple, and so powerful, that the person who
first creates it deserves to have their name go down in history. But
interment windshield wipers aren't one of those. They are a weeks worth of
work for any junior engineer.

If there is something behind this story which irritates me, it's the patent
system and intellectual property rights in general. I think it's good that
a company can invest big R&D dollars and feel safe in being able to recoup
their investment with the help of intellectual property laws preventing
other combines from copying there ideas and profiting from the research
they didn't pay for. But what irritates me, are the squatters who take
advantage of the system by simply patenting every obvious idea they can
dream up, 5 years before the obvious idea becomes practical in the market
place. So when the market develops to the point that it's time to do the
weeks worth of engineering to put that interment feature on the wipers, you
find some idiot filled a patent for the obvious idea 5 years ago and now he
thinks you should pay in 10 million dollars for this "invention". In fact,
he didn't invent anything and invested almost nothing in his R&D effort. He
was just an intellectual property speculator.

I have to wonder if the true story about this math teacher who "invented"
the "interment wiper" was just someone who thought he had invented
something big, when in fact he hadn't done anything substantial at all, and
was ignored by the auto industry because of the fact they didn't think he
had done anything worthy of reward. But then, using intellectual property
law, he forced their hand and made them pay out just to keep from looking
like the big bad auto industry had "stolen" this guy's "great idea".

But maybe I'm wrong, and maybe his solution wasn't obvious and was a great
idea. I'm looking forward to finding out more when the movie comes out.

--
Curt Welch http://CurtWelch.Com/
http://NewsReader.Com/

On 29 Sep 2008 00:20:42 GMT, the infamous (Curt Welch)
scrawled the following:

--big snips throughout--

So, what petty idea was stolen from you to get you so vitriolic?

I've invented 100's of things in my life. It's what most good engineers do
just as part of their job. Nothing has been stolen from me.

Ah, that says a lot. You have a totally different mindset than he did.
My grandfather was more like you, in that he gave his idea for a
specialized ophthalmoscope to the AOA and didn't want anything for it.


There are engineering ideas that are once in a life time types of
inventions that deserve special attention and wealth to the creator. And
maybe, there is something about this guy's solution that deserves such
attention. I just don't see it yet. I will no doubt see the move when it
comes out (I see most the big movies) so I'll find out if if there is
something I'm failing to understand when I see it.

I see that I tend to give more sway to the inventors than you do.
shrug I'll see the movie, too.


Just -try- to tell me that you've never used them, Curt.

I use them all the time. They are extremely useful. But it wasn't a big
invention that resulted from a stroke of genus. They come under the
classification of stuff I consider obvious. I'm not sure (it was a long
time ago and I was in grade school), but I'm fairly sure it's one of the
millions of things I thought up before I heard they existed. It's just
obvious engineering.

It wasn't at the time, and nobody had exploited their ideas into a
product. Why isn't that "extremely useful" product worth a patent to
you? Interesting.


If there is something behind this story which irritates me, it's the patent
system and intellectual property rights in general. I think it's good that
a company can invest big R&D dollars and feel safe in being able to recoup
their investment with the help of intellectual property laws preventing
other combines from copying there ideas and profiting from the research
they didn't pay for. But what irritates me, are the squatters who take
advantage of the system by simply patenting every obvious idea they can
dream up, 5 years before the obvious idea becomes practical in the market
place. So when the market develops to the point that it's time to do the
weeks worth of engineering to put that interment feature on the wipers, you
find some idiot filled a patent for the obvious idea 5 years ago and now he
thinks you should pay in 10 million dollars for this "invention". In fact,
he didn't invent anything and invested almost nothing in his R&D effort. He
was just an intellectual property speculator.

Yeah, the patent world is absolutely nuts right now. Whatta crock!


I have to wonder if the true story about this math teacher who "invented"
the "interment wiper" was just someone who thought he had invented

"Interment"?!? It wipes the dead bodies or something? vbg


something big, when in fact he hadn't done anything substantial at all, and
was ignored by the auto industry because of the fact they didn't think he
had done anything worthy of reward. But then, using intellectual property
law, he forced their hand and made them pay out just to keep from looking
like the big bad auto industry had "stolen" this guy's "great idea".

But maybe I'm wrong, and maybe his solution wasn't obvious and was a great
idea. I'm looking forward to finding out more when the movie comes out.

Ditto.

Ciao!

--
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.
-- George Bernard Shaw

Has anyone read that patent? I haven't. But many patents are issued
for their unique method of implementation, not necessarily the overall
idea. ----In other words, the feature that got the patent could have
been a non-obvious or super cheap(at the time) timer and switch
mechanism rather than the "idea" of intermittent wipers.
Guess I'll have to see the movie, too.

In the Twin Cities, there's an inventors club that meets monthly. This
sort of thing is exactly what they meet about. The mentor of that club
puts on a one day seminar now and then that explains how to go about
patenting things. The point is, as some other posters have said, ideas
ARE a dime a dozen. It's the people who push them that make them go.

One saying around the company I worked for was: "Prove that you can
sell $100,000 worth of them (it) in the first year or forget it."

Hey, Tom, are you related to the folks who made the movie? Was all this
just to sell more tickets? ---Just kidding.

Pete Stanaitis
----------------------------



Tom Gardner wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)

In article ,
spaco wrote:

Has anyone read that patent? I haven't. But many patents are issued
for their unique method of implementation, not necessarily the overall
idea. ----In other words, the feature that got the patent could have
been a non-obvious or super cheap(at the time) timer and switch
mechanism rather than the "idea" of intermittent wipers.
Guess I'll have to see the movie, too.

The patents are listed in the Wikipedia article on the inventor:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kearns

Use http://www.pat2pdf.org to obtain the patents.

Joe Gwinn


In the Twin Cities, there's an inventors club that meets monthly. This
sort of thing is exactly what they meet about. The mentor of that club
puts on a one day seminar now and then that explains how to go about
patenting things. The point is, as some other posters have said, ideas
ARE a dime a dozen. It's the people who push them that make them go.

One saying around the company I worked for was: "Prove that you can
sell $100,000 worth of them (it) in the first year or forget it."

Hey, Tom, are you related to the folks who made the movie? Was all this
just to sell more tickets? ---Just kidding.

Pete Stanaitis
----------------------------



Tom Gardner wrote:
I'm seeing previews for the movie about the invention of intermittent
wipers
in '63. Think how things have changed in 45 years. Today, a manager at a
design firm would tell a group of engineers to design such a system and
have
several designs on his desk by the end of the day. True, they didn't have
555s in '63. So, is it that a unique idea is a lot more important than the
actual design?

If you remember some of my previous posts about nurturing ideas that lead
to
designs, this has been an area of extreme interest to me. In the movie, it
looks like Ford screws the idea/design guy, which makes me sick. Designers
and model builders need more respect but idea guys need to be revered!
(coming from a guy that has had very, very few, if any, original ideas)

Joseph Gwinn wrote:
In article ,
spaco wrote:

Has anyone read that patent? I haven't. But many patents are issued
for their unique method of implementation, not necessarily the overall
idea. ----In other words, the feature that got the patent could have
been a non-obvious or super cheap(at the time) timer and switch
mechanism rather than the "idea" of intermittent wipers.
Guess I'll have to see the movie, too.

The patents are listed in the Wikipedia article on the inventor:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kearns

Use http://www.pat2pdf.org to obtain the patents.

Joe Gwinn

Well, I was not going to spend time actually doing the research to see what
the movie was about, but since you made it so damn easy, I had to look.

With a quick look, I see he was using transistors with an R/C circuit to
create the timer. Oh, yeah, no one would have thought of that.

In patent 3,351,836 (the first one listed in the Wikipedia article) figure
5 even has an error in it as far as I can see. The I and C contacts are
switched for the L/C timing circuit which drives the transistors and
creates the timing circuit. But that was just one of multiple examples and
the other examples seemed correct. (and maybe I'm wrong - I did only spend
2 minutes looking at it).

None of that is anything but obvious engineering work and as far as I can
tell, the entire patent dispute was a famous case debating exactly that -
i.e., where should the line be drawn between "obvious engineering" and
"original idea"?

It is clear from looking at the patent that he spent time doing the
engineering work and turning the idea into a workable design. But still,
it's just obvious engineering work and not anything like a "stroke of
genius" in my book. NO way in hell he deserved multiple billions of dollars
for what was probably only a few years of engineering work. He deserved to
be paid a salary for a few years of work if, and only if, he could find
someone willing to buy his work - which it seems he couldn't, in which case
he should have lost his entire investment for doing engineering work that
no on wanted at the time.

This is exactly the type of case in my book that shows we should shut the
patent system down.

Still, I bet it will be an interesting movie....

--
Curt Welch http://CurtWelch.Com/
http://NewsReader.Com/

On 29 Sep 2008 04:55:54 GMT, the infamous (Curt Welch)
scrawled the following:

None of that is anything but obvious engineering work

To _you_, _now_, sure. If it was so obvious, Curt, why didn't _you_
invent it back then?

How obvious was it back then? In the _automotive_ industry, not the
electronics industry?

Hindsight is 20/20. 'nuf said.

--
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.
-- George Bernard Shaw