Having a Patent Doesn’t Matter!

I’m not a patent attorney. Partially because patents drive me nuts! Actually, people drive me nuts when they advertise their patents.

How many infomercials have you seen where the product is touted as “patent pending”? This simple statement is supposed to give you confidence in the snake oil or kitchen gadget.

But what is a patent? It’s a legal construct to keep somebody else from copying your invention. That’s all.

Patents don’t mean that an invention works like it’s advertised. They don’t mean the government approves of the gadget or that the inventor can even legally market it. I could patent a method of robbing banks, but I wouldn’t be allowed to legally use it.

Don’t get me wrong here: obtaining a patent isn’t easy. The process can be long and complicated. And it typically requires costly attorney’s fees to help with the application.

But consumers should not let themselves be suckered into purchasing something just because it’s patented. That shouldn’t even matter for a consumer’s purchase decision.

By the way, the Lego man above is patented. Don’t you want one now? Actually, the last Lego patent expired in 1988. But you never saw Lego using “it’s patented” as a marketing technique.

Photo by Dunechaser