I just saw a headline about Ford patenting a system to eavesdrop on passengers conversations to serve them related ads. If I had patented that before, could I stop it from being used?
In theory yes
In reality, they will find a way around your patent.
Look up the patent on window wipers as an example
This oddly reminds me that the original patent for the chainsaw was for aiding childbirth.
I’ll let anyone curious enough google that.
I’m not doing the research on that. That is horrifying
If it makes you feel better they were tiny compared to what’s at home depot
Curiosity got the better of me a while back. It’s horrifying and incredibly interesting at the same time.
You use the chainsaw to open the lady and pluck out the baby? What a genius idea. This will save a lot of time. /s
Kearns and the car windshield wipers?
I think that might have been his name.
In theory yes, you have to remember though that you have to enforce parents yourself. If you suspect infringement you will have to sue and carry the lawyer costs, at least until a court judges in your favor. This is off course besides the costs of applying for the parent itself. Your patent might also not be valid in all countries.
In practice the chances of a private person doing this and winning against a multi-billion dollar corporation without going bankrupt are negligible.
First of all patents run out generally after 20 years. And then everyone can use your technology.
The whole idea of patents is incitivising inventors to publish their invention for everyone to see. In exchange they get a period of exclusivity. This way they also don’t have to deal with as many trade secrets.
Even if nobody finds a way around, that would be incredibly expensive.
With all the other comments, it becomes pretty obvious that the easiest way to do it, would be being a multi-billionaire in the first place… Wait a second…
the US government would find some way to eminent domain it.
That’s… not how eminent domain works…? Like it’s scope only applied to stuff like building sidewalks, roads, bridges, and other infrastructure.
yeah, I didn’t feel like going around to dig up the technical term. everybody knows what I meant, which is why I said it that way.
If you’re not going to take the effort type “can a government use patents” into Google and look at the top link. It took me less than a minute to find that government using a patent is just baked into the patent system. There’s not additional law around it. So it might be better to go the WD 40 route and never actually file a patent to the formula to avoid sharing the formula publicly.
Pretty sure companies like bp and shell do exactly that. Except the harm reduction is to their oil profits. Can’t have competing tech on the market
