Post by thread:Subject: Re: Looking for Bob BLICK

Bob Just a quick hello... I downloaded your files some time ago and showed it around to some people in my office. One guy got very enthusiastic and actually built a clock. It works very well, and here from my office I can see it standing on his PC. It has really attracted so much attention from people passing by. Then the other day a tourgroup passed through the company and when one of the group saw the propellar clock he immeadiately shouted out "Its a Bob Blick Propellar clock!". So it seems that you have gotten instant fame all around the world with your ingenious design. Even down here in Africa people know your name. ; ) Rgds Werner

While we are on the subject.. I would like to thank Bob for posting his design for us all to use I have mine up and running. I could not find video or DD motor so I used a motor from cassette tape recorder ( it probably won't last long running 24 hours a day though ). The spinning arm I mounted vertical with the led's mounted on it without the 90 Deg bend. Bob's program works great on this setup, the three poles give me one display per rev. mclockt.hex with the smaller numbers work best on this setup. The only reasons for the changes I have made are that I did not have any other motor and vertical spinning makes it easier to mount on a wall, I have a six year old (and friends) who (still) have ten fingers Thanks again Bob -- Peter Cousens email: spam_OUTpeterTakeThisOuTcousens.her.forthnet.gr snailmail: Peter Cousens, karteros, Heraklion, Crete, 75100, Greece, phone: + 3081 380534, +3081 324450 voice/fax After Bill Gates announced to the world that he was Microsoft, his wife was asked to comment. She said that as his wife, she had been the first to notice this problem

At 04:18 PM 12/03/97 +0000, you wrote: >Maybe Bob should patent his clock before someone else starts >marketing it ... Sadly - that won't stop anyone from making a profit from it AND sharing a proportion of that profit with Bob. Patents are great for publishing and great for setting a date of note- worthiness - but cost a great deal to defend - often far more than any business plan can identify as 'unencumbered returns from commercialisation' and I think we can guess that real returns are usually less than those identified in a 'optimistic' business plan. In Australia we have the Federal Police to handle copyright infringements, but a patent infringement does not result in any (automatic) response from governments... Even with Oz Federal Police we have to raise a writ - but its cheaper by far than issuing action over possible patent infringement. So I tend to lean towards copyright as a mechanism coupled with trade-secrets - but, I think we already had several threads about that and PIC code copying already. Rgds Mike Some say there is no magic but, all things begin with thought then it becomes academic, then some poor slob works out a practical way to implement all that theory, this is called Engineering - for most people another form of magic. Massen

Geoff Wootton <.....woottongKILLspam@spam@isdugp.bham.ac.uk> wrote: >Maybe Bob should patent his clock before someone else starts >marketing it ... > The concept is already patented. In fact this design could infringe so if anyone wants to commercialize this, beware. -- Bob Fehrenbach Wauwatosa, WI bfehrenbKILLspamexecpc.com

At 11:26 AM 12/03/97 -0600, you wrote: >Geoff Wootton <.....woottongKILLspam.....isdugp.bham.ac.uk> wrote: >>Maybe Bob should patent his clock before someone else starts >>marketing it ... >> > > The concept is already patented. In fact this design could > infringe so if anyone wants to commercialize this, beware. Could you tell us what the title of the patent is - I'd like to look it up ? I can't see that concepts are patentable - implementations are - yes ? I can see that the commercialisation of 'a' design could infringe but surely if B.Blick were to design another form and not commercialise it then that would NOT be an infringement - yes ? Rgds Mike Some say there is no magic but, all things begin with thought then it becomes academic, then some poor slob works out a practical way to implement all that theory, this is called Engineering - for most people another form of magic. Massen

Mike <EraseMEerazmusspam_OUTTakeThisOuTWANTREE.COM.AU> wrote: >Could you tell us what the title of the patent is - I'd like to look it >up ? Hi Mike, I probably have a copy somewhere in a real safe place. If you have any sort of search capability, the inventor is Edward Sokol. The patent would have issued in the mid 80's, possibly as early as 1984. I'll look to see if I can find the number. The invention, in this case, was a rotating drum with LEDs on the rim. It was intended as a point-of-purchase display. I'm not too sure how broad the claims are and whether they would include Bob Blick's design. I am in occasional contact with Ed Sokol and if I remember I'll ask him the next time he calls. He sold the patent a couple of years ago. I did the electronic package for the original prototype - 1980 or 1981. We did both single and multicolor versions. Fun project. -- Bob Fehrenbach Wauwatosa, WI bfehrenbspam_OUTexecpc.com

Not to mention a patent should be defensible before you bother to pay the many thousands it takes to get overall. A patent has to be NOVEL (IE unique) not just a different use of an idea. There is a light stick toy that's been out for many years, and you can bet they have a patent on the swinging lights if they were able. (Doubt it because I've seen the basic idea from the sign industry for quite a while.) Not that Bob's idea isn't very neat and a very good one, just all the individual parts have been done before, and that makes a patent almost impossible to defend. Not to mention you have to make a couple of million off of it before it was worthwhile. Besides ;) I have had a working system (running on a seagate hd platter and then a floppy drive motor, 3000+ rpm was too much for easily balancing a battery and pc board system) since last summer for strobing 24 led's on each blade of a RC helicopter. You should see what a five foot disk of 48 2000mcd leds look like flying around at night! Mike wrote: > > At 04:18 PM 12/03/97 +0000, you wrote: > >Maybe Bob should patent his clock before someone else starts > >marketing it ... > > Sadly - that won't stop anyone from making a profit from it AND sharing a > proportion of that profit with Bob.

A great place for all to review patents for free is the IBM patent site on the web: http://patent.womplex.ibm.com/ You can search for a specific patent #, boolean text search.......and so on. -Pete @spam@peter.cesarzKILLspamappl.ge.com {Quote hidden}>---------- >From: Bob Fehrenbach[SMTP:KILLspambfehrenbKILLspamEXECPC.COM] >Sent: Wednesday, March 12, 1997 3:35PM >To: RemoveMEPICLISTTakeThisOuTMITVMA.MIT.EDU >Subject: Re: Subject: Re: Looking for Bob BLICK > >Mike <spamBeGoneerazmusspamBeGoneWANTREE.COM.AU> wrote: >>Could you tell us what the title of the patent is - I'd like to look it >>up ? > >Hi Mike, > >I probably have a copy somewhere in a real safe place. If you have >any sort of search capability, the inventor is Edward Sokol. The patent >would have issued in the mid 80's, possibly as early as 1984. I'll >look to see if I can find the number. > >The invention, in this case, was a rotating drum with LEDs on the rim. >It was intended as a point-of-purchase display. I'm not too sure how >broad the claims are and whether they would include Bob Blick's design. >I am in occasional contact with Ed Sokol and if I remember I'll ask him >the next time he calls. He sold the patent a couple of years ago. > >I did the electronic package for the original prototype - 1980 or 1981. >We did both single and multicolor versions. Fun project. > > >-- >Bob Fehrenbach Wauwatosa, WI TakeThisOuTbfehrenbEraseMEspam_OUTexecpc.com >