You know I thought I had a great idea, a great invention. I did some patent searches to make sure nobody else had taken my idea. Did more and more research and finally said I am ready to go for it. So after nearly a year of working my tail end off and getting my product to market, I find out through a very nasty letter from an attorney that I had stolen someone else’s idea. What!? You’ve go to be kidding me.

Think this can’t happen to you? We see articles like this one, click here, that companies or individuals are suing others for taking their ideas. What drives me nuts about the whole deal is the person that filed the patent had no intentions of doing anything with their idea; they just wanted to patent it!

What would be done? How could this have been avoided? Well first off my patent search must have gone in the wrong direction at some point. I really feel like I should have seen this. But hence I did not. This may be a good place to hire a patent lawyer. They will do an exhaustive search of the system to make sure that your idea, although yours had not been imagined by someone else.

After that you should be well on your way to realizing your idea! Do the homework and you won’t end up being used.