Inventions Hardware???

Where did you go to school? Where is your area of expertise on a personal level?

Hey Ottawa too! :)

I am a self-taught historical reseacher by trade who has plenty of time these days to come up with new INVENTIONS. I am a creative unemployed individual. I have had this "great" solution for a computer hardware application for some time now but dont know whom to approach??. Live in Centretown Ottawa and use the Public Library computers.

If you have no knowledge of computers how do you know that your idea is feasible? We often get people in here who believe that they have a good idea, but the idea is almost always already implemented or not practical. People without enough knowledge rarely realize what is practical and what isn't.

This doesn't mean your idea has to be bad, but ask yourself if you're sure it really is such a great idea. Also you say you have both a problem and a solution, but is the problem also secret? If not do you mind sharing it? People might be able to point you towards other solutions to the problem which might be better than yours.

And of course, you have no evidence that your idea is worth a dime, so don't expect people here to believe you. We get way too many people with similar claims and without any kind of proof people see no reason to believe you.

And to answer your original question, I doubt anyone would even look at your idea. If you really are serious about protecting it I guess a patent would protect it, but I doubt you could get anyone to actually make it.

Ideas alone are a dime a dozen. They're worthless without research, prototypes, etc. to back them up. You can't patent an idea alone, you need at the very least a formal and exacting description of the process involved.

I'm sure someone has discovered and come up with their own solution to this problem, and may have even gone the step further in actually working out the details and implimentation. This is what you have to do to bring your idea into any sort of tangible existance.

Honestly, I get the impression that you're putting the cart before the horse a little bit. You're probably young, excited about what you're sure is a great idea and worried about being robbed of all the fame and fortune it will bring you. You've documented the date of your posting manually, created a very specific forum signature, and even chosen your user name all to make sure that, should anyone try to take your idea, you can point and say "look, this is the first time I mentioned my idea in public!" Tell me when I'm getting warm.

Frankly, people have all kinds of ideas all the time, some revolutionary - mostly not, and if you don't do the leg work to take them beyond just an idea you don't really deserve any credit or riches. Plenty of otherwise famous scientists, inventors and business men are relegated to simple foot-notes because someone else ended up proving, building, or implimenting a thought they once had.


So, my advice to you is to either work hard at turning your idea into a real, tangible solution or to simply give up your idea to the world at large; if it really is a great idea you can at least have a warm, fuzzy feeling inside that you've made the world just a little bit better.

I'm not trying to be discouraging, just to orient you a little more towards reality. I've "Invented" plenty of things in the past only to have them implimented successfully years later by someone else. The day I got my NES when I was 5 years old I sat down with my dad and designed "Deer Hunter" for it which was eerily close to the hit PC game that came out more than 10 years later and has spawned dozens of sequels, off-shoots and rip-offs.

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Original post by OttawaMarc Whom do I direct my idea to without getting it stolen??

Either:
A) A friend
B) Consult a patent lawyer, explore your legal options; perhaps they can write up a contract that will protect the idea so that you can hire someone to make it.

A -> free
B -> $$

Trusting your idea to strangers on the internet without a lawyer's oversight is a bad idea.

-me

Thats actually not a bad idea, however I think it would be difficult to commercialize: reason being that just about any programmer with the motivation could probably write a small application service, or maybe even a script that could do just that. Presuming that there is a log-in / log-off process, and the OS exposes some message or hook for pre-log-off processing it would be almost trivial. check the root of any removable media drives, sound the PC speaker alert, and cause the optical drive to eject automatically.

I do appologize for the false assumption on your age, most of the people around here are the younger crowd. My tone was perhaps a bit off in this new light, it was merely intended to snap those younger minds back to reality a bit.

.Now that I have told the world!!ahhhhhhhhh, it wasnt such a bad idea. At the Library here they have a express check out on books etc and the screen flashes if you have left your libraray card in. So maybe some sort of method could be used that is similar? I dont know what to do?? Is it worth looking into, not sure, I just dont have the $$ to pursue it. the othwer problem is a patent search would have to be done just because we dont see it doesnt mean it aint out there!!

The market would be very small (Libraries and Kinko's?) for a product like this.

But, it should be pretty easy to develop for Windows. You would need to hook login/logout, use GetLogicalDrives() and GetDriveType() to find removable drives, and use GetDiskFreeSpace() or FindFirstFile()/FindNextFile() to determine if a disk is inserted. Searching for files may cause a error dialog to pop up, this may have to be trapped (somehow).

Hehe, this could be an awesome product...

Call it the Nosy Neighbor. Have it use something like Microsoft Agent (Word's paperclip) to ask "Did you intended to leave your floppy in the slot?" or better yet, "When do you intend to remove your floppy from the slot?"

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Original post by Anonymous Poster Can not a 'Beeper mechinism' of some sort be installed or 'Flash screen' to let the user known that he/she has left the disc or floppy in the computer??

My car has such a beeper just in case I left the lights on. Now imagine if you had a patent on the general idea of such a beeper... $$

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Original post by cdoty "When do you intend to remove your floppy from the slot?"

That's what SHE said! ;)

Sorry...just HAD to say it.

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Original post by SirKnight That's what SHE said! ;)

Or, call it Nagging Wife. :)

I'd love to see you on 'dragons den' in the UK. I dont know if its been broadcast similarly in the US or not.

This is also a software invention, not hardware. Software ideas are almost impossible to patent outside the US, just because 'its an idea'. You can only patent methodologies. If you write it though its a different thing then, it becomes copyright theft.

I would probally guess that the general idea is already patented ie FLASH SCREEN hardware or TIME OUT, basically we would use the idea for the same use in another product. Yes building it into the unformated floppies or discs would be a software issue. I have contacted 2 companies in China and one in Toronto, the same company that makes the FLASH SCREEN kiosks heree at the main branch of the Ottawa Public Library. As they use these technology allready and someone is supposed to get back to me.

Thanks

Two showstopping problems:
In my experience, public machines tend to have their sound switched off, because it's annoying.
Anybody with programming experience could replicate your program in 5 minutes, and they'll just release it as freeware.

Theres all those Internet Cafes on the globe too!!

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Original post by alun Two showstopping problems: In my experience, public machines tend to have their sound switched off, because it's annoying. Anybody with programming experience could replicate your program in 5 minutes, and they'll just release it as freeware.

mm, this pretty much limits its profitability to the US, Japan and other countries that allow pure software patents, (or considers it possible for pure software to infringe on patents).

Ofcourse if you do it as a hardware device with its own sound and flashing lights it should be patentable everywhere (unless it infringes on some other patent :)), (Though you still have to compete with similar free software offerings in most countries)

(And people argue that patents help innovation.... 90% of the time your new invention will infringe on ~30 or so insanely broad patents in country X and another 50 or so in country Y)

and remember they pay $3.00 a day for an 8 hours shifts at WalMart in Hondouras

I would just tape a string to your floppy so that it can still go in and out of the drive and clip the other end to your belt...or maybe have a little red sticky on the keyboard that says, check for floppy!

Speaking as someone who has filed for patents and done some product development, trust me, its a very tough game that end up ruining 99% of people who get the bug. Fact, even if you get a patent, 99% dont make money. As with any product, the problem is controlling the idea, protecting the idea, marketing, finding the market, and most marketing channels are tied up, just to name a few hurdles.

If you are unemployed, and maybe thats because you are not cool with the kissing a bosses ass part of working, you need to develop your entrepeneurial skills. This can be as simple as shaving, then doing lawn contracts, painting, cleaning windows or houses, detailing cars, doing renos, getting a hot dog cart, buying crap at yard sales and selling it on ebay - and if you are creative, find a way to do it with a twist, that makes you stand out, and permits you to charge a premium.

If you are just alergic to work, well you wont find the easy button with inventing.

Randy