Miller,

I do enjoy our exchanges. Reminds me of many years ago on the board. The back and forth about patents vs seen examples.

I have been exchanging emails with an international patent attorney based in Europe. He has helped educate me a bit. Seems there were different standards that various countries used regarding intellectual property. In Belgium, "patents by work" and "trade marks by first use in commerce" were the norm. While in the US, changes in method required a new patent to be filed to amend previous patents, this was apparently not the case in Belgium. I don't even pretend to understand all this. If there is a patent attorney reading this, HELP!

It all started when I mentioned the "Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property of 1883".

Gil, thanks.

Buzz, most of what we see today came about by trying to invent the "better mouse trap". Do a search on Google patents for "mouse trap", you will be amazed....

Any how, that is why I put together that patent compendium, as Daryl calls it, for US patents. I am working on a similar one for British patents. Any one care to work on a French or German patent compendium?
http://damascus-barrels.com/uspatentnom.html

Wild Skies,

Here is an excellent site for such things.
http://www.hallowellco.com/abbrevia.htm
Be sure to check out the photos for each definition.

Pete

http://www.damascus-barrels.com/Movie.html