Raw computer parts

Does anyone know if you can just buy raw computer parts anywhere? I'm talking like buying just the chip for bluetooth, CCD chips (or I could steal it from a cheap webcam i guess), and OLED screens (transparent if possible). I've got an idea for a new piece of electronics but I need to build a prototype before I can patent it.

 

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http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&...official&q=buy electronic chips&aq=f&aqi=&oq=

 

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Well it depends. What parts do you want?

Don't worry, just by giving the parts won't tell me what it is.

I just need to have a general idea of what to look for. A website selling graphics cards is far different from that selling ARM A9 processors.

 

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www.digikey.com

 

You might need to build a prototype in order to verify that your gadget functions as you expect it to.

Unless you are trying to patent a perpetual motion machine, I do not think you need to provide a prototype. I do not think you need to prove that the device works.

Companies & individuals often apply for & obtain patents long before they know that a device works as intended. They are allowed to do this in order to cut down on the probability of somebody beating them to the patenting of a similar device (which would prevent them from obtaining a patent).

 

If it can be proved that they did this, they lose the patent. You aren't allowed to patent "speculative inventions."

Believe: You probably don't need a prototype.

 

Nasor: You obviously cannot get a patent without a reasonable description of what it is expected to do and some drawings showing how it is to be built.

If it can be proved that they did this, they lose the patent. You aren't allowed to patent "speculative inventions."​

You do not have to prove that it functions as described or provide a working prototype (except for perpetual motion devices).

 

Dinosaur:

US patent law requires that inventions actually work. The Patent Office can request a prototype for any invention, but in practice this is virtually never done. Perpetual motion machines are simply summarily rejected as non-working.

But that's not what I was talking about in my last post; I was responding to your statement:

That isn't true, for the reasons discussed above in my post #6. Yes, as you indicated, there is always a chance that someone else will beat them to the invention, but that's just a risk that one takes. The patent goes to the first person(s) who actually figure out how to make the invention work, not to the first person to dream up an idea that they don't know how to implement.

 

Nasor: If you know somebody familiar with patent law, ask them about proof of functionality. Except for perpetual motion devices, a working model or other proof of functionality is not required.

You believe that the existence of a patent is proof of functionality. This erroneous belief has resulted in many people being scammed. The patent office does not require proof that a device works.

As I posted earlier, patents are often applied for prior to the existence of a working prototype. To avoid being beaten to the patent office, a patent is often applied for prior to any proof of either practicality or functionality. A knowledgeable company will apply for a patent as soon as it can satisfy the Patent Office requirements for drawings, a description, & some indication of how the device is to be manufactured. The latter requirement need not be the actual method used when the device is actually manufactured. It need only be a plausible method of manufacture. For example: Casting might be described in the application & upset forging might actually be used later.

Check the following.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/11/1111_051111_junk_patent.html​

If the above link does not work, do a search using: Patent and perpetual motion” The following are excerpts from that Web site.

A perpetual-motion machine may defy the laws of physics, but an Indiana inventor recently succeeded in having one patented. On November 1 (circa 2005) Boris Volfson of Huntington, Indiana, received U.S. Patent 6,960,975 for his design of an antigravity space vehicle. Volfson's craft is theoretically powered by a superconductor shield that changes the space-time continuum in such a way that it defies gravity. The design effectively creates a perpetual-motion machine, which physicists consider an impossible device.

Some people might consider patents on unworkable products to be relatively harmless. Park, a physics professor at the University of Maryland at College Park, disagrees. "The problem, of course, is that this deceives a lot of investors. You can't go out and find investors for a new invention until you can come up with a patent to show that if you put all this money into a concept, somebody else can't steal the idea. Approving these kind of patents can make it easier for scam artists to con people if they can get patents for screwball ideas."

Perpetual-motion machines have long held special appeal for inventors—particularly during the concept's heyday around the turn of the 20th century. Patent applications on such devices became so numerous that by 1911 the patent office instituted a rule that perpetual-motion machine concepts had to be accompanied by a model that could run in the office for a period of one year. I think that the patent office requested & was granted an exception to existing law. I do not think the patent office has the authority to change the rules established by existing legislation. ​

BTW: The Patent Office apparently did not recognize that the above was a perpetual motion device.

I first became aware of the patentability of non functional devices 40 or more years ago, when I learned that some people had been scammed by a device alleged to convert rotary motion of moving weights into unidirectional thrust. The device was obviously not functional. Check the following patents via a Web search.

Patent 3653269
Patent 3998107
Patent 5782134
Patent 6745980​

The first of the above might be the patent I mentioned. All of them use some weird scheme for converting rotary motion into unilateral thrust. The later patents probably claim to be some novel improvement on the earlier ones.

 

Believe me, I'm pretty familiar with patent law.

As was previously stated, the Office can require a prototype for any invention as they see fit, perpetual motion or otherwise. If the inventor doesn't provide it, the Office can choose to reject the application under Title 35 USC S. 101 for failing to meet the utility requirement (assuming the utility of the invention is implausible in some way). But in practice this is almost never done, including perpetual motion cases - they are supposed to get summary rejections. Yes, sometimes they slip through when the Examiner isn't doing their job properly.

No, as previously stated, I believe (correctly) that US law requires an invention to actually work in order to get a patent. Of course, it's always possible that someone could scam the PTO by fraudulently filing an application on an invention that didn't work and fabricating evidence of functionality, thus tricking the Office into issuing an illegal patent. But that would be fraud, and such a patent could be voided later on if the invention's lack of functionality comes to light (even if the same invention is later found to be useful for some other purpose). Not to mention potential problems with little things like Title 18 USC S. 1001.

The PTO Examiner is always supposed to determine whether or not the application is plausibly useful for its intended purpose. Sometimes, in the case of things like mechanical inventions, it's self-evident that it would work from simply looking at the diagrams. For things like drugs, the inventors must submit evidence (e.g., clinical data) that provides some reason to believe that the drug works. If the Examiner doesn't think that the invention could possibly work (as with a perpetual motion machine), the inventors would need to provide extraordinary evidence that it was functional. There have been instances of applications for things like cold fusion machines being rejected as non-functional even though the inventors had actually published experimental data in peer-reviewed science journals that purported to show that the device worked.

Yes, companies frequently do this, but they play a dangerous game and risk having their patents invalidated later. This is particularly common in extremely competitive, fast-paced fields like medicine and biotech; a company will have a shaky idea about some new drug/genetic sequence/whatever, and rush to file it before the utility is established, only to lose out to another company that took its time and actually got its act together before filing.

 

Nasor: Your post #10 included the following.

Believe me, I'm pretty familiar with patent law.​

Frankly, I see no reason to believe that you are familiar with patent law. You believe (as do many others) that the granting of a patent indicates that the Patent Office has verified that the device actually does what it is claims to be able to do. This is an erroneous belief as indicated by my post #9 (with some citations) and an analysis of patent 6,960,975 (see below).

So far, you have only expressed your own opinions relating to patent law. Without some supporting citations, I see no reason to accept your opinions as valid.

You mentioned Title 35 USC S. 101 & Title 18 USC S. 1001 as supporting your notions about patent law. I did a search & found nothing pertinent to our current discussion.

Could you provide a quote from one of those sources (or from some other source)?

You have not provided any citation indicating that the patent office requires proof that a device works as described.

My post #9 provided abstracts from a pertinent article & information which would allow you to check that article on the Web. The article clearly indicates that a U of Maryland professor believes that unworkable devices can be patented. It also mentions a specific instance of such a patent: A space craft described with techno babble. It is patent 6,960,975 & is claimed to be unworkable by knowledgeable physicists.

Do a search for patent 6,960,975, read a few of the articles, and tell me if you think the patented space craft will perform as described.

My post #9 also provided some patent numbers identifying patents issued for non functional devices alleged to turn rotary motion into unidirectional thrust. These are devices which essentially pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.

One (I think all) of them describe the rotation of weights which move toward & away from the center of rotation. The concept is that the weights are farther from the center of rotation when moving down & closer to the center of rotation when moving up. It is claimed that this results in a net upward thrust. This seems to be the patent that I became aware of 40 or more years ago.

One of the later patents describes a similar concept, but seems to use three sets of rotating weights, one for each axis of a Cartesian coordinate system. This is claimed to allow net thrust in any desired direction. I believe this patent is claimed to be an improvement on one or more of the other patents.​

Those patents describe devices which obviously cannot produce the claimed thrust. They are examples of patented devices which do not work. The patent office essentially requires the following for mechanical devices.

A description of what the device is expected to do.

Enough information to describe how the device can be made.​

Given the above data, the patent office is only concerned with making sure that the patent does not infringe on previously issued patents. Once granted, a patent can be revoked if the patent office is shown that the device was described in some article prior to the date of the patent application. Id est: The device must be original, which is a basic requirement (the patent office does not attempt to do an exhaustive search of information other than contained in previously issued patents).

 

There are two issues here. The first issue is whether or not US law requires a device to work in order for it to receive a patent. It does, and the Office is supposed to reject inventions that don't work. The second issue is whether or not it's possible for someone to scam the Office and trick them into issuing a patent that should have been rejected for lack of utility. It happens - patent examiners screw up sometimes.

So no, the Office does not "verify" that inventions work, in the sense that they don't demand a demonstration; we typically take the inventor's word for it that the invention works, and assume that any evidence of utility (e..g, experimental data) has been provided in good faith. If it later turns out that the evidence was fabricated, that's a matter for the courts to deal with, not the Office. Unless the claimed utility is so implausible that the evidence provided by the applicant is unbelievable, in which case a rejection for lack of utility is required.

Sure. I'm afraid this much drier than National Geographic News, but it's more legally accurate. Regarding 35 USC S. 101:
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/documents/2100_2107_01.htm

See also: http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/documents/2100_2107_02.htm

Still awake? If so, there you go. As for 18 USC S. 1001, that statute makes it illegal to submit false information to the federal government. It would probably be of some relevance to a person contemplating attempting to scam the patent office by submitting false evidence of utility.

Such patents issue when the Examiner screws up and fails to do his/her job properly.

The utility of the device must also be credible, as explained in the wall of text that I quoted above.

The patent can also be revoked if it can be shown that the device is non-functional. Also, the Office does more than simply search previous patents - they also search academic journal articles, books, the internet, product literature from companies, and pretty much any other source you could think of. While such a search could never be exhaustive, Examiners do their best.

Edit: Changed my quoted text to try to make it more readable.

 

Also, in addition to my wall of text, even your own National Geographic article indicates that inventions are supposed to have to work in order to receive a patent.

From the second page of the article:

 

Nasor: It is not as simple as the following from your post #12 suggests.

There are two issues here. The first issue is whether or not US law requires a device to work in order for it to receive a patent. It does, and the Office is supposed to reject inventions that don't work. The second issue is whether or not it's possible for someone to scam the Office and trick them into issuing a patent that should have been rejected for lack of utility. It happens - patent examiners screw up sometimes.​

A device need not work at the time a patent is applied for. The following is from 2107.01 General Principles Governing Utility Rejections (further on than the section you cited in post #12)

. . . . Usefulness in patent law, and in particular in the context of pharmaceutical inventions, necessarily includes the expectation of further research and development.. . . .​

The patent law (or perhaps court intepretations) allow for applying for a patent in advance of a device being known to be functional. This is critical in the case of pharmaceutical inventions, but also applicable to other types of invention.

The patent office is faced with a requirment for proving a negative as indicated from the following (excerpts from 2107.01 in your post #12)

2107.01 General Principles Governing Utility Rejections. . . . However, as the Federal Circuit has stated, "[t]o violate [35 U.S.C.] 101 the claimed device must be totally incapable of achieving a useful result." . . . .In short, the defense of non-utility cannot be sustained without proof of total incapacity. . . .Situations where an invention is found to be "inoperative" and therefore lacking in utility are rare, and rejections maintained solely on this ground by a Federal court even rarer. . . . .Examples of such cases include: an invention asserted to change the taste of food using a magnetic field . . . . a perpetual motion machine . . . . a method for increasing the energy output of fossil fuels upon combustion through exposure to a magnetic field . . . .​

The above clearly indicates that the Patent Office has the burden of proof for inoperability.

It is not so much a case of scamming the patent office as taking advantage of the requirement that an examiner must prove that the invention cannot function even if it is improved via further research and development. The following are examples of unworkable devices. Most, if not all, are anti-gravity bootstrap devices.

Patent 3653269
Patent 3998107
Patent 5782134
Patent 6745980
Patent 6,960,975​

The last is for a Starship, which obviously could not be proven to function, but apparently a patent office employee decided he could not prove that it was unworkable. I think this one was viewed as a perpetual motion machine by physicists.

Oddly enough the following patents for cold fusion devices were granted, even though the patent office has refused patents for cold fusion devices (I think) on the basis of their being contrary to well established laws of physics

Patent 4,943,355
Patent 5,036,031
Patent 6,248,221​

BTW: Prior to 1900, there were a lot of patents granted for perpetual motion machines, which was a concept rejected by phyicists in that era. While the patent office will not now grant patents to devices which are obvioulsy perpetual motions machines, I am not sure they are required to go by the opinions of mainstream science.

 

The invention has to have at least some functionality for its intended purpose at the time of filing, and your patent application must disclose all the information that a person skilled in the art would need to make your invention work. You are allowed to conduct further research and improve your product more after you file, but your invention is required to work at the time of filing. If further research is required to make your invention work, then in the parlance of patent law it is "not enabled" and so in violation of 35 USC S. 112, 1st paragraph.

No, the Office merely has to establish a prima facie case that a person of ordinary skill in the art would be more likely than not to doubt the utility of the invention.

MPEP 2107.02:

See above; the Examiner only has to show that, based on a preponderance of evidence, the invention as disclosed in the application is not likely to work.

You keep providing examples like these, but they are not relevant to the issue at hand. As has already been explained repeatedly, these are examples of the Office screwing up and failing to examine properly. I can cite plenty of examples of cops beating confessions out of suspects, but that doesn't mean that it's legal for them to do so.

Also, at the risk of having my carefully-cited arguments degenerate into an appeal to authority, I will now admit that I am in fact a patent examiner with the USPTO. And before anyone asks, no, I don't know what's going on with the guys who do the software patents...