Anything Under the Sun Made by Man

Patent Searching Resources

I encourage many of my inventors to do their own patent searches, especially when they are developing new ideas. There is nobody more qualified to perform a search than the inventor who knows their idea and can benefit from seeing other people’s versions of their idea.

60 Day Pendency for Design Patent - A New Personal Record

I just received a Notice of Allowance on August 3, 2009 for a design patent filed June 3, 2009. That is a pendency of 61 days. This eclipses my previous record of 71 days for a design patent.

The current case was filed electronically with a Petition to Make Special based on Age.

Inventor Grandiosity: Dealing with the Kitchen Sink Invention

This post is part of a series of posts relating to inventor interviews. Other posts include The Art of the Disclosure Meeting, Doing the Disclosure Meeting, Setting the Stage and Issuing Warnings, and Inventor Myopia.

During the invention disclosure meeting, I can count on running into the Kitchen Sink Invention at least once in five inventions. The Kitchen Sink Invention is the result of grandiose expectations of the invention or extremely overbroad view of the invention. The Kitchen Sink problem is the inverse of the myopic inventor.

The Kitchen Sink Invention is the one that is so broadly defined that it does everything. Interestingly, I run into the Kitchen Sink Invention occasionally with software engineers, people with marketing perspectives, early stage entrepreneurs, and independent inventors.

Dealing with Inventor Myopia

This post is part of a series of posts relating to inventor interviews. Other posts include The Art of the Disclosure Meeting, Doing the Disclosure Meeting, and Setting the Stage and Issuing Warnings.

Often, inventors stumble into two different pitfalls. The first is myopia, where the inventors think their invention is much smaller than it may well be. The other state is one of grandiosity, where the inventor thinks too highly of the invention.

In this post, I will discuss myopia. In the next post, I will discuss grandiosity.

Setting The Stage and Issuing Warnings for the Invention Disclosure Meeting

This is part of a series of posts that deal with Invention Disclosure Meetings. The first one discusses the Art of the Disclosure Meeting and the second talks about Doing the Disclosure Meeting.

Russ Krajec