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Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail)

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On 20/09/2026 6:09 pm, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
> On Sun, 20 Sep 2026 16:13:55 +1000, Bill Sloman wrote:
> 
>> On 20/09/2026 8:03 am, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
>>>
>>> On Sun, 20 Sep 2026 02:25:11 +1000, Bill Sloman wrote:
>>>
>>>> On 19/09/2026 8:04 am, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> But you don’t need to prove something works before getting a
>>>>> patent.
>>>>
>>>> It's frequently helpful to have a working example. The
>>>> counter-current continuous digestor was quite a tricky design -
>>>> which is why Johan Richter could never get any of his versions to
>>>> work - and potential users would set set up industrial scale
>>>> trials.
>>>
>>> What exactly stopped him getting the patent on the idea? Because
>>> that’s what patents are -- a Government-granted monopoly on an
>>> idea.
>>
>> If you can't reduce it to practice - lawyer-ese for making it work -
>> it isn't a valid patent.
> 
> That’s not what “reduce to practice” means. Remember, it only applies
> to the wording of the patent application. All it means is “make the
> description sound plausibly as though it *could* work”.
> 
> If “reduce to practice” really meant “prove it works”, then none of
> that notorious stream of patents on perpetual-motion machines would
> ever have been granted.
> 
>>>>> Thomas Edison put together the first working electric light-bulb.
>>>>> Did he get the patent on it? No, because that was already taken
>>>>> by Joseph Swan.
>>>>
>>>> Who'd done quite a much development work as Thomas Edison.
>>>
>>> The patent went to the person who thought of the idea, not the one
>>> who made it work.
>>
>> The US patent went to Thomas Edison who had made his idea work in the
>> US, and the UK and European patents were taken out by Joseph Swan who
>> had made his version work in the UK.
> 
> That self-evidently makes no sense at all. If it works in one place,
> it works in both places.

Except that Edison and Swan used slightly different carbon filaments.
Edison ended up with bamboo-derived filaments, while Swan used 
parchmentised cotton threads before going over to carbonised nitrocellulose.

>> By setting up a joint company, Edison and Swan avoided a lot of
>> expensive litigation
> 
> Except that ...
> 
>>>> Both inventors patented much the same invention at much the same
>>>> time, and found it expedient to set up a joint company to exploit
>>>> them.
>>>
>>> Only after Edison fought unsuccessfully to overturn Swan’s patent,
>>> I believe.
>>
>> That gets it backwards. Swan sued Edison in the British court for
>> patent infringement when Edison tried to sell his lamps in the UK
>> and won.
>>
>> Edison started countersueing Swan in the US in 1882, but his legal
>> team didn't like their chances, whence the joint company.
> 
> Why didn’t his team like their chances? Didn’t Editson already have
> his own patent? Why was that considered weaker than Swan’s patent?

Swan had got there first. Read the history.

-- 
Bill Sloman, Sydney

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Re: google reads your mail "Johann \"Myrkraverk\" Oskarsson" <johann@myrkraverk.invalid> - 2026-09-16 23:39 +0800
  Re: google reads your mail Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-09-17 16:51 +1000
    Re: google reads your mail Lane W <cactus_DAC@yahoo.com> - 2026-09-17 02:43 -0600
      Re: google reads your mail Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-09-17 23:34 +1000
        Re: google reads your mail Lane W <cactus_DAC@yahoo.com> - 2026-09-17 08:43 -0600
          Re: google reads your mail Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-09-18 15:36 +1000
            Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail) Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2026-09-18 22:04 +0000
              Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail) Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-09-20 02:25 +1000
                Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail) Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2026-09-19 22:03 +0000
                Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail) Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-09-20 16:13 +1000
                Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail) Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2026-09-20 08:09 +0000
                Re: Patents (was Re: google reads your mail) Bill Sloman <bill.sloman@ieee.org> - 2026-09-20 18:25 +1000

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