Thank goodness we have the patent system to encourage innovation and protect intellectual creation!
Here are a couple of recent patents: Vision facilitation apparatus and method (i.e., a monocle); and Method to improve peri-anal hygiene after a bowel movement (putting gel on toilet paper to aid in wiping). Don’t try these at home, folks–you could be sued since patents have a “presumption of validity”!
The ‘942 patent is a particularly good example of how granting patents in non-scarce things, such as methods or recipes, grants others partial control of the propery of others, including their bodies–here, this dude Putman in theory could get an injunction prohibiting you from putting your own gel on your own toilet paper.
The PTO has ordered these patents to be reexamined… still, it’s pathetic they were ever allowed. More wacky patents. (Courtesy Martin Meder.)
3:44 pm on October 21, 2003
