Much of info about protecting inventions patently false

Perhaps nothing in the law breeds more myths than patents. The mere definitions of patents, copyrights and trademarks are confusing enough: Patents protect inventions, innovation and improvements to existing technologies; copyrights protect songs, books, articles, software code and other “works of authorship”; and trademarks safeguard the names of products and services.

The following is a list of commonly heard patent-related myths:

• A “poor man’s patent” can be achieved by writing down an idea and mailing it to yourself. The truth is that “strategy” is probably a waste of a postage stamp. There is really no such thing as a poor man’s patent. In fact, in February 2007, the U.S. Patent Office eliminated its Disclosure Document Program, citing the fact that it provided no benefit to inventors and that some people erroneously believed, despite the Patent Office’s warnings, they had achieved patent-pending status.
• Firms that market or promote inventions will protect your idea and pay you handsomely. The truth is many of these companies are scams. The Federal Trade Commission and the Patent Office regularly issue warnings about these usually unscrupulous companies.
• Obtaining a patent means the money will start flowing in. The truth is that owning a patent rarely equates to financial rewards. It does happen on occasion, but there are now more than 7 million patents, and you can bet that many, if not most of them, cost more to procure than they are worth.
• Before you apply for a patent, you must conduct a patent search and you must have a working prototype. Although these activities might be a good idea in certain cir- cumstances, they are not prerequisites for filing a patent application.
• A patent application is a form that you can fill out yourself. I have heard this one a lot, but the truth is a patent application is a hybrid legal and technical (engineering) document with drawings that depict and a specification that describes the invention. There is no patent application form.
• You have never seen this product before, so it has to be patentable.The truth is there are a lot of “wouldn’t it be nice”-type products and ideas that never made it, for one reason or another, onto the shelves of stores. But there are lots of old patents for these kinds of ideas, and your idea will not be patentable if the same or a similar idea is the subject of a prior patent.

A few additional myths about patents, none of which is true:

• You can file a worldwide patent.

• A competitor cannot copy your product because you have a patent pending.

• Patents are only for revolutionary ideas.

• If you cannot get a patent, you can always use trade secret (or copyright or trademark law) to protect a product.

• Having a patent means that you are free to sell your product.

• You have to wait to get a patent before you can sell a product.

The best advice is to educate yourself. Visit the Patent Office website at www.USPTO.gov, or join an inventor’s networking group before starting down the expensive patent-pend-
ing road. There are some success stories out there but also many disappointed inventors.
Kirk Teska is an adjunct law professor at Suffolk University Law School and is the managing partner of Iandiorio,Teska & Coleman,an intellectual property law firm in Waltham. He can be contacted at kirk[at 

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