[General] Advice about Patents

Thu Aug 27 19:16:14 PDT 2015

Hi John W,

I wanted to give you some advice concerning filing a patent application on
an idea at an early stage of development.  I was the president of a company
with over 200 employees.  About 5% of our budget and employees were involved
in research.  I was always generating new ideas. My rule was that if there
was a new idea which had a chance of working, I would judge the risk/reward
ratio to determine whether it was worth devoting precious resources to
experimentally test the idea.  If the decision was that it was worth
perusing, the first step was to file a patent application.  The reasoning
was that it might take 2 years to determine whether the idea is feasible.
If we waited until that point that we were sure it worked, then there is a
chance that someone else would file a patent application first.  An idea
which is cutting edge at one point in time can be fairly obvious at some
later time.  

In the US, it takes over 2 years before the patent office even gets around
to even examining the application.  It is very easy to abandon the patent
application any time before it is approved.  In fact, I purposely had
defects in the patent application such as "informal" drawings so there was
no chance that it would get approved before I could make this go - no go
decision and before revised claims could be filed.  The informal drawings
are merely drawings that show the idea but are not done by a professional
patent draftsman.  I would also not involve a patent attorney in the initial
filing to keep down the cost. 

Almost always the application is turned down on the first examination.  Even
ideas that are completely new are usually met with an initial rejection.  I
viewed this as a good thing that actually strengthens the patent if it is
eventually granted.  The reasoning is that if it is granted without
objection, then there is no time to revise the claims and also the patent
file is very thin.  In the future, there might be a law suit involving the
patent.  If this has to go to court, it is actually a stronger patent if it
can be shown that many patents were initially cited against it, then in the
rebuttal phase, the inventor presents arguments which the patent examiner
eventually found as convincing.  That analysis and history makes a stronger
patent.  

I presume that your electron-positron idea passes tests such as not
violating any conservation laws. If you are serious, my advice is to file a
patent application as cheaply as possible.  It only needs to have one claim.
It just needs to have all the technical points covered.  In the future you
can hire an attorney to write new claims. Claims can be added any time up
until the patent is granted.  It is even possible to add a new introduction
which describes prior art. The only thing that you cannot do is add new
technical information if you want to keep your original filing date.

I am the inventor on over 30 US patents and numerous foreign patents.  I
have also abandoned many patent applications that I did not want to pursue
after some initial work or after more information became available.  

Sincerely,

John Macken  

From: General
[mailto:general-bounces+john=macken.com at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org]
On Behalf Of John Williamson
Sent: Thursday, August 27, 2015 4:47 PM
To: davidmathes8 at yahoo.com; Nature of Light and Particles - General
Discussion <general at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org>
Subject: Re: [General] Fw: light-light interation

Dear David, Andrew et al,

Had a quick look at those - they seem to be all, as yet, theoretical.

The reason I'm interested is that I have an idea for energy generation by
creating electron-positron pairs. I considered including it in the "photon
and electron" paper - as an "experimental test" - but it seemed a little too
way-out.

May be better put into a patent proposal!

Regards, John.

  _____  

From: General
[general-bounces+john.williamson=glasgow.ac.uk at lists.natureoflightandparticl
es.org] on behalf of davidmathes8 at yahoo.com <mailto:davidmathes8 at yahoo.com>
[davidmathes8 at yahoo.com]
Sent: Friday, August 28, 2015 12:25 AM
To: Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion
Subject: [General] Fw: light-light interation

Martin

http://www.gizmag.com/experiment-to-turn-light-into-matter/32107/ 

Quantum Control of Light & Matter
Gordon Research Conference

https://www.grc.org/programs.aspx?id=12818

A photon-photon collider in a vacuum hohiraum

Pike et al (2014)

http://www.nature.com/nphoton/journal/v8/n6/full/nphoton.2014.95.html

Other references

How to Take Light and Make Matter
<http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/05/how-to-create-matter-
from-light/371155/> 

 <http://www.nature.com/nphoton/journal/v8/n6/full/nphoton.2014.115.html>
Light into matter

Optical physics: Antimatter creation in an X-ray bath
<http://www.nature.com/nphoton/journal/v8/n6/full/nphoton.2014.118.html> 

D

----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Andrew Meulenberg <mules333 at gmail.com <mailto:mules333 at gmail.com> >
To: David Mathes <davidmathes8 at yahoo.com <mailto:davidmathes8 at yahoo.com> >;
Andrew Meulenberg <mules333 at gmail.com <mailto:mules333 at gmail.com> >; robert
hudgins <hudginswr at msn.com <mailto:hudginswr at msn.com> > 
Sent: Thursday, August 27, 2015 1:55 PM
Subject: Re: [General] light-light interation

oops! 

http://www.gizmag.com/experiment-to-turn-light-into-matter/32107/ 

On Thu, Aug 27, 2015 at 4:54 PM, <davidmathes8 at yahoo.com
<mailto:davidmathes8 at yahoo.com> > wrote:

missing attachment

  _____  

From: Andrew Meulenberg <mules333 at gmail.com <mailto:mules333 at gmail.com> >
To: Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion
<general at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org
<mailto:general at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org> >; Andrew Meulenberg
<mules333 at gmail.com <mailto:mules333 at gmail.com> >; robert hudgins
<hudginswr at msn.com <mailto:hudginswr at msn.com> > 
Sent: Thursday, August 27, 2015 1:52 PM
Subject: [General] light-light interation

new ref for light-light interaction to form e-p pairs.

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