I have to disagree with my business partner, Jeff. Unless I completely
missed the tone of several emails over the last few days (indignation and
contempt?), I'd like to add just a bit of semi-informed background on the
question of patenting. Unlike copyrights and trademarks, which are
"registered" (in other words, I wrote this book, song, etc. and I am hereby
declaring publicly -- by registering it -- that I did....so, everybody out
there, steal it at your peril!!!!), patents are "granted". Big, big
difference. Registering copyrights and trademarks doesn't involve the
equivalent of a patent search or anything like it by either the applicant or
the copyright office. Securing (being "granted") a patent, on the other
hand, is a whole other world involving a ton of research by both the
applicant and the patent office.
But the key point here is this: The fact that an idea, practice or concept
has been around for a while, even a long while, doesn't somehow mean it's
not potentially patentable by someone --even if he or she didn't directly
develop it. Most inventions for which patents are granted are really an
aggregation of and rely on all kinds of past work and experience in order to
coalesce into a unique idea. The applicant is sometimes the first one to
recognize its novelty and utility and to spend the time, energy and money to
slalom through the patenting process.
Once the application is made (and it is a LOT of work and has to satisfy a
number of standards), the patent office's job is then to see if the
purported invention is, in fact, an invention (you can't, as an example,
patent gravity, even if nobody else has tried before -- and possibly not the
general process of brewing compost tea) and whether it is indeed truly novel
or whether it bumps into a nearby idea which has already been patented (i.e.
"prior art"). In the context of the compost tea issue, it is important to
remember that the patent office doesn't keep a huge folder of ideas or
practices of things (comport tea?) that should or could have been patented
but haven't been. What they have are 6 million existing patents to compare
the applicant's to and see if it infringes on someone's "prior art". Nor
does the patent office care whether something that is patentable can or
should ever be made commercial. Not their job. I hope this is useful.
Comments or clarifications? Hi Jeff! See you Monday! Wayne Lewis,
Anchorage
From: soilfoodweb_at_aol.com
Reply-To: compost_tea_at_yahoogroups.com
Date: Sat, 7 Dec 2002 01:33:59 EST
To: compost_tea_at_yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [compost_tea] Re: Composting Council
Can I send you a copy so your lawyer can send it? I have several articles
actually, some published in 1999, long before any hint of Alms submitting a
patent.
I'll pay for your lawyer to send the letter. Just help me make sure the
patent is denied, because the air bubbler systems were clearly public-domain
long before Alms thought of his machine.
Elaine
President, Soil Foodweb Inc.
www.soilfoodweb.com
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Received on Tue Dec 10 2002 - 21:45:13 EST