Patent #6360693

BobG

The white-out thread (plus memories of Patent #4,669,216 ) got me going and I came across this: Patent #6360693

Simple. Useful. And entertaining, too! What a great invention! (My dog, Zoie, seconds that opinion.)

Jimmy Snyder

And this thread reminds me of this patent for swinging sideways on a swing.
Patent #6,368,227

BobG

I can see some huge liability issues with this invention - kids will start smacking into each other right and left and a few will smack right into a tree! He'll pay out way more in lawsuits than he'll ever earn from this invention.

See, the problem is that some people think good ideas just grow on trees. You have to put some serious thought into some inventions.

Evo

He got a patent for this?

zoobyshoe

I'm frankly outraged. This technology presented in this patent was developed by zoobies and constitutes an important component of our brush shelters.

Evo

I just read Bob's link. I have some of those animal toys in my backyard.

Jimmy Snyder

I don't issue 'em, I just laugh at 'em. A kid thought of the idea and his father, being a patent lawyer, saw it through. You can't force the patent office to give you a patent, they have their own way of doing things. If you apply for a patent and get it, then by definition, your idea was good enough for a patent.

jim mcnamara

The fact that the kid got a patent and hist father is a patent lawyer says more about how the system works, not the merits of the patent.

BobG

Those don't appear to be the same object as the inventor's. They have a solid main section with a longitudinal length extending a predetermined distance, but they appear to lack the two protusions extending along a second and third longitudinal axis not parallel to the first. That makes all the difference in the world.


Plus, if you read the actual patent really, really carefully, the actual invention is imbedding scents and flavors into the toy. The similarity to a stick is intentional since the dog should be able to identify the toy to be retrieved by scent alone (the flavor is positive reinforcement during training the dog to retrieve objects based on scent).

This is what happens when you hire a patent attorney that spends so much time learning legal language that he forgets to look out his window once in awhile. People laugh at you.

Jimmy Snyder

What does it say about how the system works? You should be aware that the patent office passes judgement on the originality of inventions, not the quality.

BobG

I hope you paid for them; otherwise you should put them back where they came from.

Surely, you don't have one of these, though - the ropeless jump rope.

This looks like a good idea. It's safer than a regular jump rope because you won't trip yourself with the rope - even on those difficult crossover moves.

kach22i

Oh my God..............we are a crazy nation.

zoobyshoe

Clearly, you've never smelled a zoobie or smelled or tasted a piece of a zoobie brush shelter.

Moonbear

Things like that may start to get harder to slip past an examiner very soon. A new rule was supposed to go into effect Nov 1, but there's currently an injunction against it while folks fight the patent office about that rule (it would put an unfair burden on small inventors who don't have the money to pay an attorney for something that they would previously have been able to file on their own). The rule is supposed to require the patent application include all the prior art searches. Currently, it's the job of the examiner to catch if there is prior art it infringes upon, not the filer. The large firms will already do a prior art search, but that's just to make sure it's patentable before they spend a lot of time working on it, but nobody gets penalized if you miss something (other than potentially not getting the patent, or having to revise your claims).

Moonbear

I think there's a whole group of my former classmates who will need to sue them for stealing our invention. We invented that back in the 70s!