Quote:
Originally Posted by CraigS
So what of ceramic tiles for the space shuttle, graphene, doped silicon, computer screen materials, heat shields for space probes, jet turbine blades etc … the point requires balance … and there's plenty of evidence to balance it up !
My point is that inventions require lots of effort to make them a society-benefitting success. Education assists the inventor to participate in the realisation of that benefit and thereby justifies them in claiming the benefits which stems from their expend effort.
|
The only thing that makes an invention a society benefitting success is the commercialisation of the product and marketing. You can test an retest and scientifically prove an invention all you like. If it's not mass produced and marketed properly, it goes nowhere.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CraigS
There ain't no such thing as a free lunch these days.
To think there is .. is a delusion.
|
Never has been a free lunch at any stage.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CraigS
Not a hinderance ... a burden … and that burden is still there even for the uneducated inventor .. just as Mr Ward is finding out.
|
Ward knows what he used to make the material. He may not know why his material does what it does, but a lot of inventors have been in that situation. And it seems from the testing that the scientists don't even know why this material performs as it does...therefore, so much for the benefits of scientific proof, in this case. Science is not the paragon of all knowledge, nor do scientists know everything about anything. It wouldn't be the first time something totally out of the box has appeared on the scene.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CraigS
Are you saying that Ward isn't attempting to 'tie things up in non-disclosure agreements' ???
He has that right, too … and he knows it ..
The issue is a debate over the value of what he's discovered.
And until its commercialised by having endured the burden of proof, it has little value.
|
Ward doesn't want to tie things up in any non disclosure agreements, but he doesn't want someone to test his material and then reverse engineer it without his knowledge or permission and patent it as their own. That's theft of intellectual property, but with the way the law is now, he'd have no leg to stand on. He has no patents, therefore no proof that the material is actually his, in the eyes of the law. That's why he's applying for patent, now. To tie them up with a legally binding document giving him his rightful intellectual property over the material. He doesn't mind who he sells it to or who uses it, but he doesn't want anyone in particular to tie its use up or have advantage over anyone else. That's why the US companies and government backed off. They wanted it all for themselves. All Ward ever wanted was 51% of the profit. If the corporations and governments got their way, he'd get a handshake at best and told to go on his merry way. The only thing that Ward can be accused of, initially, is of being naive about the way big business and intellectual property works.
As I said before, the people that did test it know what it can do and they want it. They'll do all the commercialisation and such, but they want to get their grubby hands onto it and keep it exclusively. All this is about is money and what comes from it. Ward has every right to ask for the amount he wants, it's his invention. But the big corporations and the government want not only the money, but also the full rights to the material and Ward won't let them have it. That's why nothing has come of it and why they backed off. As if they won't make huge profits from it anyway, they want it all.