POOR MAN’S PATENT

Ever since law school I have been asked about the “Poor Man’s Patent”. And ever since then the answer is the same now as it was then: there’s no such thing. According to the “Poor Man’s Patent”, the inventor simply writes down his invention on paper and sends it to himself in the mail. Supposedly, this sealed envelope with the postmarked date will signify the date of invention and will somehow accord monopoly rights in the invention. The idea of a “Poor Man’s Patent” is an enduring myth with the staying power of urban legends such as Elvis sightings and UFO’s. These urban legends may sound “truthy” but are specious.

The only way to protect the novelty of an invention such as novel devices, business methods, and unique designs through patent law is to file a patent application. Now, it is true that establishing a date of reduction to practice is important in some cases, a “Poor Man’s Patent” is probably not the way to go. A better method of establishing a date of invention is a lab notebook. In this lab notebook, the inventor would record his experiments, date and sign it in every entry. However, you should note that a lab notebook would NOT give you patent rights either. It would simply establish a date of conception or reduction to practice for the invention which may be important in subsequent patent prosecution or patent litigation.

Now, if someone is looking for the cheapest way to protect intellectual property, Copyright law might be applicable in limited cases. One example may be source code or object code in software. Since software code is protectable under both patent law and copyright law, a Copyright registration might accord some intellectual property protection. However, you should note that the $45 registration fee would not protect against reverse-engineering and other various fair uses which may not completely protect your invention. Note that Copyright law will not protect inventions such as devices, novel methods, etc. Copyright law only protects the expression of ideas, and not the underlying ideas themselves.