Christmas banners and patent fun!
Many of my software friends have expressed disinterest – or even distaste in anything having to do with patents. Maybe it’s the RIM thing… or the Microsoft / Linux suspicion… whatever! I think they’re missing the point.
Even if you’re not an entrepreneur, patents – and the patent process – can be valuable at establishing your credibility as an inventor. One aspect of this credibility develops when your granted patents are referred by others.
The same game gets played out in the medical research field. Researchers will submit to a medical journal an article describing their experiment and results. That journal’s editors will decide whether to pulish the article. Once published, other researchers will use that article to conduct further research and publish further articles… You can infer that if many researchers reference a past publication – the more influencial it was on medical research. All of these references are tracked in the Medical Citation Index.
jump back to software… how influential was your idea?
Patents aren’t just about money and lawsuits. They’re an historical record of innovation. Just like Baxter was off chasing rabbit tracks in the forest this weekend, our old patents are chasing new inventors pictured in the banner!
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