[Ferro List] Patents - off-topic

[Walter Jeffries]

The whole patent system is a farce.

Ideas are a dime a dozen.
I come up with ten patentable ideas before breakfast and many more  
during the day. I have notebooks full of designs.

Of the far fewer things I have made with the designs there were many  
great ones but the same thing can be accomplished other ways.

Of the miniscule number of ideas I've taken all the way to market  
some of them have made me millions of dollars.

But, the inventor should not get such a long lockout on the idea.
More so, if the inventor doesn't do anything productive with the idea  
they should not be allowed to hold any claim.

An idea is about 1% of the job and it is the easy work.
Engineering, product development, production, marketing and sales are  
the other 99% which all take the long term hard work.

Put 10 engineers in the same room with a problem and they'll come up  
with three valid, reasonable solutions. To patent any of them is a joke.