Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Crazy Oddball Impossible Application round-up

Since November of 2000, all applications for patents are published after 18 months by default. As an Applicant, you can choose to forgo that for various reasons by sacrificing some other options down the line. But none of that is important right now because easily 75% of applications are published, probably quite a bit more. But as a consequence, applications which will likely never be granted a patent (and thus never be made public) are now published. And if you have a certain amount of money, you can file an application with the US Patent and Trademark Office, and they will examine it. Thems the rules.

Now there are real names attached to these and it's not my intent to slander or unfairly represent anything they applied for. Mainly because I don't think I need to; they speak for themselves. There's also a bunch of them so there's no way to do each justice. They are all really good though. If you're actually interested in one, you can use the links to Google Patents (Our Most Beneficent Overlord, peace upon Them).

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Number 1: "Magnetic Vortex Wormhole Generator" to John Quincy St.Clair of the Hyperspace Research Institute in San Juan Puerto Rico. Read that last sentence again, out loud. From the drawings, the invention seems like two big solenoid coils with a steel triangle between them.

"This energy finds many application in new types of power supplies, inertia-less and mass-less spacecraft, vehicles that can travel light-years by moving out of dimension through hyperspace, surgery-less medical tables, cranes for lifting heavy objects, cold-welded crystals for crystal rotors, folding space waveguides, and electromagnetic field propulsion vehicles using highly relativistic fields."

Those are all good things! Our troubles are over!




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Number 2: "Universal Epistemological Machine (A.K.A. Android)" to William Datig. It seems like it's supposed to be a "universal machine translator" like in Star Trek or something, but with the (A.K.A. Android) actually in the title, I'm not sure.

It has a lot of really bizarre flow charts though. The one on the cover is roughly "General forms of human beings" to "The Human Experience" to "U.G. Structure of Universal Epistemological Machine" with the tag of "Specification of the UM in existential form of enablement default and existential modes". This then evolves somehow into [Economy] [E=mc*2] and [y=f(x)]. And that is literally the first page alone.

There are over 200 following flow charts. Pages and pages filled with phrases like "RG Continuum" and "Non-Real Form" and "Future Art" and "Connectedness by DSXS of CTS" and "Phenomenology of Correspondence (H Determination)" and, really appropriately, "Endless Word Stream." And those are just the drawings. There are still 200 pages of text following.

While the examples are technically endless, every one of its 400 pages is filled with it. It's astonishing. Here's the link again if you don't believe me.

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Number 3: "Method of Recording and Saving of Human Soul for Human Immortality and Installation For It" to Alexander Alexandrovich Bolonkin. Following up a 400 page behemoth, this underdog weighs in at only 10. As an examiner, I personally respect brevity. *insert Big Lebowsky quote here*

This one does appear to be from a non-native English speaker, and that shouldn't be held against him. It would also be hilarious if was a native speaker, because he's from Brooklyn. But his intent and descriptions are clear. From paragraphs 37-38:

"To support the brain and body, humans spend about 99% of their time and energy, and eventually what knowledge is gained is taken to the grave in death. There is only one solution to this problem - re-write all of the brain information (our soul) in more strongly based storage." He then launches into how he knows this much storage isn't possible yet but then somehow gets past that and goes into this:

"It would be easy to attached a video recorder and microphone to a man's forehead and then attach sensors to the body and record all that he sees, hears, speaks, his feelings, reactions, and activity. And then re-write this information into a personal hard drive... at the end of each day." And because what we do and say makes us who we are, recording that is "backing-up" our souls. Moving on.

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Number 4: "Multi-Chambered Personal Survival Device and an Orally Inflated, Flush Mounted, Hybrid Bladder" to William Courtney. I don't even know where to start with this one. At least conceptually I think I understood what the other ones were for. Maybe not #2, I guess. But this...

It looks like some rubber and neoprene monstrosity to keep you alive out at sea for... well, forever I guess. I don't know. He's got a bunch of bags hooked up to his mouth and ears (I think that's what I'm seeing) and seems like he's encased in a Michelin Man consume. And no, I don't know what the cylindrical container under the series of what I'll call "face bags" is supposed to do. The phrase "hybrid bladder" in the title makes me a little worried though. SUPER!





And last but certainly not least (and I mean that this time), number 5: "Godly Powers" to Christopher Roller. No figures needed for this one! The entire abstract follows (the italics are mine). If you've actually read this far, don't stop now.

'Christopher Anthony Roller is a godly entity. "Granters" had been given my powers (acquired my powers) (via God probably). These "granters" have been receiving financial gain from godly powers. These "granters" may be using their powers without morals. Chris Roller wants exclusive right to the ethical use and financial gain in the use of godly powers on planet Earth. The design of godly-products have no constraints, just like any other invention, but the ethic consideration of it's use will likely be based on a majority vote of a group, similar to law creation. The commission I require could range from 0-100% of product price, depending on the product's value and use.'

And this goes into some weird thing about magicians and illusions that doesn't make any sense. Also, he apparently has a lawsuit against David Copperfield. The whole thing is only 2 pages. Here's the rest. I wish I could see the written history of this particular application because I'm sure Mr. Roller had some interesting things to say in response to the examiner's initial rejection.

**SUPER IMPORTANT INTERNET UPDATE** Chris Roller has some youtube videos! Here's an interview of him by some random goofball. And here's one from some celebrity tabloid show about his lawsuit against Copperfield. His website is mytrumanshow.com in which he explains that he is, actually, the "Truman" which The Truman Show (yes, the Jim Carrey movie) is based off.

The well of material is deep but the time is short. Thanks for reading if you actually read this far.