What to do when you have a great idea
The patent system protects your rights when you come up with a unique new invention or product. The system legally ensures that only you have the right to manufacture, import, use or sell your invention. Your intellectual property rights are secured for a fixed period of time in the country or countries where you hold your patent. Others who may wish to license from you the right to exploit your idea are thus internationally regulated.
Background
Congress protects inventors
Since 1790 the patent system has been important in helping grow the economy and quality of life within the United States. Today the system has most impact on the pharmaceutical and expanding biotechnology industries.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) had its roots in the U.S. Constitution under Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 whereby, "The Congress shall have Power...To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries...." From small beginnings the current patent system has become very complex.
Internationally
Internationally, too, most countries now abide by the patent system. The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) applies international patent laws globally through such treaties as the Berne Convention, the Hague Agreement, the Trademark Law Treaty and the Lisbon Agreement.
WIPO also maintains an international database of collected patent laws so that you can access and research the system electronically.
Limitations
Even new plant varieties can be patented
The patent system may only protect your proposed patent idea if it meets specific criteria. Even in 1869, the United States Commissioner of Patents, Samuel Sparks, recognized that no more than 10 percent of all patents had any real commercial value.
Your invention or idea should ideally fit at least one of these following criteria: be a new innovation or invention; a step forward and not merely an obvious rehash of someone else's idea; be able to be made or used in industry; or be a new theory, scientific method or mathematical discovery.
Problems
Increasing workload for patent assessors
The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office cites litigation costs and patent infringement as stifling to innovation. But the U.S. patent system is also drowning in applications, according to an article by Mark A. Lemley, a professor specializing in intellectual property at Stanford Law School.
Patenting activity has grown substantially in the United States since the early 1980s.The U.S. Patent Office receives 450,000 applications a year and there's a backlog of 1 million applications and growing.
Benefits
There is never a final rejection in the patent system.
A determined patenter need never simply accept a rejected patent idea. You can go back an unlimited number of times after you've done a revision, and if the patent office denies your application again, you may keep resubmitting your modifications until it approves.
The Future
With better technology, duplications and mass submissions of inappropriate ideas will be weeded out more easily. Governments are also looking into new legislation to prevent forum-shopping whereby litigants take their patent dispute to the most sympathetic courts.
