Patents ? How To

So you have an idea or design that you think no one else has ever had. You want to move forward on the idea, but you also don?t want anyone to copy your idea. What do you do? You need a patent.

You have heard of patents. You have an idea of what a patent is. But what protection does a patent really give you? How much does it cost? How long does it last? How do I know if someone already received or applied for a patent like the one I want to apply for? How do I apply for a patent? Should I hire a patent attorney?

In this article I will try to help you answer those questions and offer a little more insight into the whole patent application process, including how to research patents to see if there are ideas already patented that are similar to yours.

The first thing you need to do is define your idea onto paper. Use as much detail as possible. You are more likely to receive a patent when you include a lot of detail and avoid anything that is vague or too broad in concept.

Once you have done this, go to http://www.uspto.gov Click the link, on the left at the writing of this article, which says patents. You are not ready to apply for your patent yet, so scroll down to where it says, ?Online Patent Searches?.

You will have two options there. One reads ?Issued Patents?, and the other reads ?Published Applications?. You will be researching both, but begin with the most important, which is ?Issued Patents?.

Use the link there that reads, ?Advanced Search?. Type in all the terms you can think of that relate to what you want to patent. Use the option that reads, ?1976 to present?, as anything patented before that date will not matter in most cases.

Search the headlined results for anything that looks like it might be similar to your idea for a patent. Click those links that apply to you. Look at the way it is formatted as well as look to see if your idea is exactly like the idea that already has a patent issued for it.

The reason I said to take note of the format in which the issued patent is displayed is for you to look at the way you wrote down the notes of your own idea and compare them. Try to format the description of your idea similar to that of a patent that is already issued. Make sure you include all the same type of information they have formatted into their patent.

If you find someone else has already received a patent that is too similar to your idea, you have just saved yourself a $215, (at the writing of this article), patent application fee.

If you do not find any issued patents that are like the idea you wish to patent, then go back to the page that had the two options, ?Issued Patents? and ?Published Applications?. Now click Published Applications, advanced search and repeat the process of searching for ideas that are similar to yours.

If you find one that is exactly like your idea, keep in mind that the first application for that patent will be granted over the newer one. It does not mean you cannot apply for it. If you can improve on your idea, then go ahead and apply. If their application is turned down for some reason like lack of detail, etc., your patent could still be issued.

If you do not find an applied for patent, then you can proceed to apply for a patent on your idea. The research part of the patent process is over. Go back to http://www.uspto.gov/ebc/index.html where you clicked on ?Online Patent Searches? before and click on ?Basic Initial Filing?.

Fill in the fields for your name and email address, then choose the type of patent you are applying for. If you are not sure of the type of patent to apply for, go back to the home page at http://www.uspto.gov and look for the search feature at the top of the page and type in each type of patent with the word definition after it.

That search feature will produce results pages of documents only. In those documents you will find answers to any questions you may have about different types of patents.

If you are sure of the type of patent you wish to apply for, then proceed through the pages. The instructions are very simple. Good luck! I hope this article has helped you learn how to research and apply for a patent!
Chuck Crawford is an established webmaster interested in various topical research. If you would like more info on Patents, please visit his website at http://patents.thegiftedone.com This article may be reprinted freely as long as all links remain active. Affiliate Website Design Articles.PN Article Science

Google's US Patent: What does it have in stock for you?

Google's US Patent: What does it have in stock for you?

What is this Google's Patent?

The filling of the US Patent (#20050071741- Information Retrieval Based on Historical Data) by Google has caught many SEOs off guard in their strategies forthwith with regard to ranking of sites in SERPs. The contents of the patent reveal that search giant has incorporated sweeping changes in the way it works, and has waged a war against search engine spam and artificial link inflation.

Google has become awfully aware that some of their results have begun to be well manipulated by people with deep pockets, simply going out and buying thousands and thousands of links. Sad enough, it has resulted into a damn situation wherein one often comes with links on the first page of the results that have nothing to do with what he or she wishes to look for.

Now, in the post-patent scenario, often used, misused and overused search engine strategies that paid off in the past, simply seem to be worn-out tools. This patent, which in all its intent strives to make information retrieval on Google on the basis of historical data, will definitely reorient it to dish out results to highly relevant and content heavy sites for a given search term.

So, what are the paradigm shifts by virtue of this patent?

- Google is all geared up to start looking at history very minutely. This, amongst other things, includes the history of your website, the history of individual pages on your website, and the history of links to your website and even pages within it.

- Google is well underway to take into consideration the traffic patterns of your site's visitors. It will sharply focus on things such as length of stay on the page that someone gets through the link as well as how many links, both internal to your site and external to it, get used by a visitor.

- Google has considered it imperative to look at user behavior on your site, and the history or the trend of that behavior. This entails not only what kinds of links are browsed, where they go, and what the link text says, but more specifically user browsing behavior and surfing patterns.

- It is going to look out for new content on existing pages as well as new pages being created. It implies that a content driven site, that people use, like, and come back to, is likely to climb up the rankings.

- Moreover, not only is Google going to begin looking at your site's history and the history of visitors to and from your site, it is also going to be grouping all of their various history trends into a single lump and provide crucial scoring.

Strategies that need a serious rethinking

- People tactically use "content randomizers" in an effort to make Google think their sites are being changed frequently. This strategy seems to be redundant as Google will be maintaining your site's history which is the crux of the new patent.

- Sites will not only need to have links as was customary in recent past, but those links will have to be utilized to be counted.

- Content "freshness" is going to matter crucially as against the past trend. Google is all set to look for "freshness" in not just your own pages, but links to your site as well.

- You can no longer lose sight on your focus in providing your web surfers what they want even though your hitherto engagement in the same yielded some results.

- Google going to scrutinize under its close observation the links to your site, the number of them, where they go. Let alone this, Google will also be tracking click through ratios of those links.

- Your site's "stickiness" is going to be important to your rankings within Google regardless of what you used to resort to get rankings so far.

So, what are the strategic choices before SEOs in the aftermath of this patent?

- Now it is in the fitness of the things that folks that sell "links" on their website should have a second thought why and how they are doing this. The patent specifications precisely call for the links to be actually used by people. So, this explicitly implies that you'll need those links to be well within content.

- With a good mix of content and links off to external sites and pages, you are likely to get most "bump," especially when the links are well surrounded by other content.

- Your Search engine strategy should take care of the fact that new content is added regularly to your site and people are actually staying to read the content.

- It is desirable to keep your pages themed, relevant and most importantly consistent. You have to establish reliability. The days of spamming Google are nearing to an end.

- When it comes to linking, you must clearly avoid the hocus pocus or magic bullet linking schemes.

Let's read writings on the walls before it is too late

- If you participate in quick fix link exchange scams, use automated link exchange software or buy hundreds of links at once, there are pretty chances that Google will interpret your efforts as a spam attempt and act accordingly. So, tread with caution.

- Since Google is capable of tracking the click-through rates to your web site, you have got to make sure that your web pages have attractive titles and utilize calls to action so that web surfers click on them in the search results

- If you stand in need of multi page content changes implement the changes in segments over time. Continue to use your original keywords on each page you change to maintain theme consistency.

- You can simply make significant content changes by implementing lateral keywords to support and reinforce your vertical keyword(s) and phrases. This will also help eliminate keyword stuffing.

- Make sure to determine whether the keywords you're using require static or fresh search results and do update your web site content accordingly. On this point RSS feeds may play a more valuable and strategic role than ever before in keeping pages fresh and right away at the top of the SERPs.

- Webmasters must look forward, plan and mange their domains more tightly than ever before or risk plummeting in the SERPs - Relevant content swaps may be a pretty fine alternative to the standard link exchange and allow you some control of the link page elements

The heart of the matter

This patent is, in fair probability, going to force websites to become much more "customer" centric, and that's always a good thing. The criterion Google has set for search rankings, and the direction search innovation is going speak volumes on Google's exemplary efforts to provide the best search service in the world.

Deepak Sharma is a Web Designer at BlueApple, a Web Design and Development Company with a well connected development infrastructure in India having a strong portfolio with global clientele and offering superior web services and solutions at competitive costs

Inventions, Patents and Profit

New Inventors

My name is Clyde Knight Jr founder of Knite Enterprises LLC. I have visited many newsletters and inventor resource websites where I found and read many interesting and informative articles. These web sites covered areas of inventing dealing with everything from creating and developing your ideas to selecting the right self-help resources.

There is a plethora of invention submission and promotion type corporations out there, as we have seen advertised on television and radio commercials. I have even experienced first hand how these companys work. They advertise one thing, but the result is a twist in legal technicalities that most inventors under estimate. In short, these invention submission corporations present the unwary, sometimes enthusiastic and often times legally nave inventor with a professionally looking office, with personable representatives and artistically enhanced forms and documents all pleasing to the eye and designed to persuade the inventor to sign away their legal rights.

Furthermore, self-help websites including the USPTO website do offer free and inexpensive resources. These resources usually explain details of the law that allows independent inventors to protect their own inventions by submitting their own ideas to the USPTO or applying for a patent themselves. Other methods of self-protection offered on these websites include retaining a combination of inventing professional to help them to submit their own patent application with out having to pay an attorneys high legal fees. Thus, saving them a costly expense.

In either of the cases sighted above what usually happens in the end is that the inventor is disillusioned, discouraged and frustrated. The inventor is discouraged by the bureaucratic red tape, precise and strictly adhered to submission protocols of the USPTO with associated astronomical expense on the one hand or legally frustrated by the immoral but legal bate and switch tactic of an unscrupulous submission promotion company on the other.

To see how these companies use the law to their advantage point your browser at http://www.ftc.gov/foia/frequentrequest.htm. There you will find which submission promotion companies are listed. In addition, the type of fraud they used on various inventors.

Many invention resource websites fail to explain that your invention may not be feasible, plausible or even marketable and that to pay for a patent application when your idea will not bring a profit may be an expense that you simply cannot afford. Additionally, they usually do not explain in a logical and clear manner the facts needed for the inventor to make an informed decision. They do not explain the facts gleaned from an objective and complete explanation of the cost and profit probability ratios - that is - the money that you spend to patent your idea vs. the probability of making a profit from your patent.

I have researched and have pain stakingly explained to the average inventor how to use the law to protect their invention with out having to disclose to a third party where their invention in all probability is most likely to be stolen. I also explain the myths, cost and profit probability ratios of spending $3,500 - $10,000 or more, when such an expense may not be in their best interest.

Our service is tailored for people who do not have or cannot afford to spend thousands of dollars on a patent. I explain that to spend this kind of money does not necessarily give the protection desired and that it does not guarantee profit. At Knite Enterprises, we take the inventors creativity and their right to claim it very seriously. We assist the inventing industry by taking the confusion out of the notion of claiming your invention and by making our services available to those of us who may have creative talent but are confused and discouraged from moving forward by financial constraints and responsibilities. To see what we are all about please visit us on line at: http://www.DIYinventor.com

Clyde Knight Jr is the founder of Knite Enterprises LLC. He started this online business in 1998. Knite Enterprises LLC recognizes the many problems that new inventors face when deciding on how to protect their ideas. Knite Enterprises LLC answers many of these questions and explains the advantages and disadvantages of traditional IP Protection.

Clickbank Vendors: Two Simple Ways You Can Help Affiliates Protect Their Sales.John Hocking

1) How To Remove Your Affiliates Clickbank Id From The URL.

As a merchant, you can hide the clickbank affiliate id for your affiliates by creating a redirect page and pointing your default hoplink to the redirect.

When some uses your hoplink http://hop.clickbank.net/?affid/yourid, the cookie will be set and they will land on your redirect page.

The redirect will send them to your domain without adding the ?hop= information. The cookie is already set and does not need to be shown.

This will help protect your affiliates commission and give your site a more professional appearance.

In the code examples below, you will need to replace [ and ] with less then and greater then symbols.

Create a file called hoplink.php

Add the following code

[?php
header("Location: http://www.yourdomain.com"); exit;
?]

Upload hoplink.php to the root of your domain.

Login into your clickbank account. Click to view or modify your account settings. Click to modify your account.

Under Business Info, change the url of your website to be http://www.yourdomain.com/hoplink.php

Click on save changes.

Now when a visitor clicks on a hoplink, it appears that they came directly to your site and the affiliate's id is no longer exposed. For this technique to be completely effective, the affiliate needs to cloak the hoplink as well.

2) How to Cloak Your Clickbank Vendor Id Using PHP

Most clickbank affiliate theft is caused by the fact that is easy to rebuild a hoplink and get credit for your own purchase. All you really need to know is the vendor id.

All you have to do is look at the source code of a typical sales link and you will see the vendor id.

For example:
http://www.clickbank.net/sell.cgi?YourVendorId/1/Product_Description

To rebuild the hoplink you simply use http://hop.clickbank.net/?AffiliatesId/YourVendorId

Now when you click on the hoplink and the original affiliate has lost a sale.

As you can see, without knowing the vendor id, you can not successfully rebuild the hoplink and the affiliates sale would be protected.

Below is an example of how to do this in PHP.

You will need to replace [ and ] with less then and greater then symbols.

Create a file called order.php

Add the following code

[?php

header("Location: http://www.clickbank.net/sell.cgi?YourVendorId/1/Product_Description");

exit;
?]

Just replace YourVendorID with your Clickbank ID Replace 1 with your product number Replace Product_Description with your Product Description

Upload order.php into the same folder as your sales page.

Now link to order.php instead of using the raw order link and your Vendor ID is never exposed

This will make it very hard for affiliates to rob other affiliates of their commissions.

I encourage you to make these simple changes to protect the commissions of your affiliates.

John Hocking created http://www.guidetoebookmarketing.com, A resource site for those looking for information on creating and marketing ebooks. You will find hundreds of articles, ebook reviews and resource links.

Trademark opposition practice

In our firm 's practice trademark registrations which reproduce well-known trademarks of foreign owners or similar to them meet routinely.

The grounds for getting such registrations by unfair players are quite clear, but it should be kept in mind that according to the Russian Trademark Law they might be opposed and canceled. We would like to illustrate the aforesaid with several examples. In 1997 the trademark WHITE &MACKAY was registered in the name of "FRINO " Ltd.,(Russia)with respect to services in Classes 35,36,part of services in Class 39,namely "transportation, packing and storing of goods excluding alcoholic drinks " and Class 42,namely "restaurants, hotels, realization of goods excluding alcoholic drinks ".

When it revealed, an opposition to said registration was filed for our client, the well-known producer of beverages, owner of the Russian trademark registration of WHITE & MACKAY, with respect to the goods in Class 33 "alcoholic beverages, whisky ".The opposition mentions that the registration in the name of "FRINO " Ltd .is obtained in violation of Article 7 (1)of the Russian Trademark Law, which prohibits a registration of designations confusingly similar to trademarks earlier registered in Russia by other individual or legal entity with respect to similar goods and services. Moreover, said registration of "Frino " Ltd. contradicts to Article 6 (2)of the Law that says "a registration should not be granted to a trademark which might mislead a consumer with respect to the person who renders services."Among arguments in the opposition we put the following. WHITE and MACKAY are common English surnames.

MACKAY might be associated with English or Scottish origin of the registration owner, which is not true in respect of "FRINO " Ltd. located in Ingushetiya, Russia.

From geographic sources it was showed that WHITE and MACKAY are also geographical names, i.e. WHITE is an island in South-East England, MACKAY is the name of the town in the State of Idaho (USA) and the name of the town in Australia. Also data about popularity of the mark WHITE &MACKAY were supplied, namely, that WHITE & MACKAY Scotch whiskey had been produced since 1844 and enjoyed by consumers all over the world. Additionally numerous registrations of said trademark throughout the world were presented to the Board of Appeals of the Russian PTO which accepted some of the arguments and stated that the opposed and the cited marks were similar in view of phonetic and semantic identity thereof, with high degree of visual similarity.

Some of the services in Classes 35,39,42 are related to the realization of goods, and in view of high degree of similarity of the compared marks, a consumer may misunderstand that all these services and goods belong to one and the same producer. Having considered all the grounds the Board of Appeals satisfied the opposition and canceled the registration of "Frino " Ltd. partially by deleting the services in Class 35related to advertising, services in Class 39 related to transportation, delivery and storage of goods, services in Class 42 related to restaurants, hotels and realization of goods.

Another example of successful enforcement of trademark owner rights is cancellation of Cyrillic trademark registration РАМКА (in English -RAMKA) in the name of"Tandem " (Saint-Petersburg, Russia) for "butter and food fats " and other goods.

Said registration was opposed by Unilever N.V., one of the largest producers of butter and food fats, the owner of several registrations for RAMA, who had been spending large budget to advertise their trademark for several years and are still spending money for advertising of the products under mark RAMA. The products marked by RAMA are well known to Russian consumers. The Russian company decided to get a benefit from such popularity, filed an application for a Cyrillic trademark of PAMKA and obtain edits registration. Non-Russian consumers do not see how much similar the Cyrillic words PAMA (in English RAMA) and PAMKA (in English RAMKA) are, and they need additional explanation. But first of all we should mention that Unilever N.V. who has been successfully marketing their products on the Russian market for many years, has not forgotten to register their mark in Cyrillic. Though many foreign companies neglect our advice and do not register Cyrillic versions of their trademarks. Anyway, Unilever N.V. got a registration for Cyrillic version of their trademark RAMA, namely, PAMA (in Cyrillic).

The word of RAMKA in Russian is a diminutive for RAMA and means a frame of smaller size. Thus the Cyrillic words in question of PAMKA and PAMA are similar against phonetic, semantic and visual criteria. While comparing the word of RAMA with Cyrillic PAMA, one could notice only phonetic similarity, but Cyrillic PAMA and Cyrillic PAMKA are similar also semantically and visually. The Board of Appeals accepted the arguments provided by GORODISSKY &PARTNERS and canceled the registration of the Russian company.

One more example is our opposition to the registration of SCANDY trademark.

The trademark of SCANDY was registered in the name of one Russian company with respect to such goods as "stainless kitchen sinks "in Class 6 and "sanitary technical equipment for bathrooms, sinks for kitchen "in Class 11.

Said registration was opposed by our client CANDY S.p.A., the Italian manufacturer of popular sanitary equipment and the owner of the well-known trademark CANDY in Russia.

Our opposition mentioned that the opposed trademark was confusingly similar to the trademark of CANDY earlier registered in the name of CANDY S.p.A. for similar goods, and therefore the opposed registration was granted in violation of Article 7(1)of the Russian Trademark Law. Trademark attorneys of GORODISSKY &PARTNERS provided comparative analysis against phonetic and visual criteria, and concluded that the marks were confusingly similar. The Board of Appeals accepted their arguments and canceled registration for SCANDY of the Russian company.

It should be mentioned that in this case the Russian company tried to appeal the Decision of the Board of Appeals at the Higher Patent Chamber of the Russian PTO but failed.

Russian trademark attorney
Law firm: "Gorodissky & Partners" Russian Patent/Trademark Attorneys

From 1982 till 1994 worked as an examiner in the Russian Patent Office.
From 1994 till 1998 worked in major IP firmes.
In 1998 joined "Gorodissky & Partners".
Deals with trademarks, namely, trademark proceedings and enforcement of trademark owners' rights.
In 1999 participated at MARQUES International Conference, Drezden (Germany).