The terms " Provisionally Patented " or " Provisional Patent " are frequently come across, both are quite wrong, there are no such things, an invention is either completely patented or not patented at all, there is no half way. No doubt what is meant generally is that the provisional specification has been lodged with the Patent Office, and a date and number has been given to it, but this is in no sense a Patent either wholly or partly, it has merely fixed the date of the Patent if applied for and granted.

It should be clearlv realised that the granting of a Patent by the Patent Office is simply permission to do a certain thing in a specified way, and for a stated time to have a monopoly in it, but any trouble or quarrels that may arise are absolutely no concern whatever of the Government, they are entirely the sole affair of the Patentee, and those with whom he differs, and such differences he must settle himself, either by arrangement privately, or by going to law.

Frequently an inventor has lodged a Provisional Specification of his invention, and then shown it to likely people with a view to getting it made, or to get financial help, he gets no promise of help, but finds in a short time that it has been made and put on the market. As stated above, he has no remedy, simply because it is not patented, but had he lodged both Provisional and Complete Specifications, and waited until the Patent was sealed, he would have then been in a very different position.

He would then have been in a position to bring pressure on the makers, and endeavour to prove that they were infringing his Patent. As a general rule most firms will not discuss a project involving an invention until the Patentee can show the copy of printed Patent, this gives them a much better position as regards the result of the official search by the Patent Office. The printed copies of all granted Patents can be seen at the Patent Office and in some libraries in many cities, but no copies or details of what has been asked for or claimed can be obtained until the Patent has been granted and printed.

Much time and money is wasted by some inventors in doing what has already been done before by someone else, and is in some cases already on the market. Anyone having an idea, and wishing to obtain a patent for the method of manufacture, etc., should make a search of what has been done before as shown by the Patent Office records, or make a search among the trade which is concerned, or, better still, do both.

From what has been said, it is clear that the work of an inventor is not without much trouble, and even when he has obtained a clear Patent, other troubles may present themselves, such as the extreme difficulty in getting a fair return for himself.

Many inventors spend their time and money in obtaining a Patent for what may be described as a special form of what is a well known object, which on close inspection can easily be evaded by a slight alteration, or again they do hit upon a new device, and then instead of claiming the device in such a way that others cannot copy it no matter how altered, they proceed to apply for a Patent for a particular form of the device, and leave the matter for others to modify in some way, and then to apply for a Patent. For instance had rubber soles and heels for boots and shoes never been used or thought of up to now, and someone then had the idea of so using rubber, it would make a master Patent if he claimed for the fixing of pieces of rubber to soles and heels of boots and shoes, and if his Patent was granted he could stop anyone else so using rubber, but if he in the first place only applied for a particular method of so fixing rubber, his Patent would only be of value until such time as someone else discovered some other way.

An inventor when thinking about the question of whether to take out a Patent or not should decide, by outside advice or otherwise, whether the invention is reallv new, whether it will have any adequate sale, whether he can effect the sale outright of the Patent or has any real chance of getting it taken up by others. An inventor's work is not nearly done when he gets the Patent granted, he still has to contrive to get paid back for his time and trouble. He may get an offer from a manufacturer to make and sell it, and pay the Patentee a royalty, this sounds very good to most inventors at the start of their career as inventors, but unless the circumstances are very exceptional indeed, he should insist upon a guaranteed annual minimum royalty, it is a fact that there are many patentees who have given the sole manufacturing rights to one firm on a simple royalty basis, with the result that the invention has been simply shelved or buried. Had a reasonable annual royalty been payable, the chances that the invention was buried are much more remote, and in any case the inventor would have at least received the annual minimum royalty.

Another point an inventor should consider well is as to the cost at which his invention can be made and offered per article to the public. Many inventions are good and would have a ready sale, but that they cannot be made at a low enough price, and hence never come to much. Yet another point is whether the materials required do exist at a reasonable cost, and whether they can be made to the design required without a great outlay on necessary tools. Rarely does it happen that anyone brings out a successful invention, unless they had an expert knowledge of the art, or process, or trade involved.

The object to be aimed at in drawing up a Provisional Specification is to define the invention broadly enough, and yet not too vaguely, at the same time to be clear and definite, not at all an easy matter for most inventors. The drawing up of the Complete Specification presents difficulties also, it must agree with the Provisional Specification, it must define clearly the construction of the invention, and lastly the claims made at the end must be well supported by the invention, they must not be too vague, or too sweeping, or irrevelant, and they must all be good in the Patent Office sense, namely, borne out by the preceding matter, definitely and clearly.

After the payment of the sealing fee the patentee is not called upon for any further regular payments for a British Patent until just before the end of the fourth year, when £5 is payable in respect of the fifth year, £6 is payable just before the end of the fifth year in respect of the sixth year, and so on until just before the end of the fifteenth year, when £16 is payable in respect of the sixteenth year.

Any Registered Patent Agent will advise as to the cost and procedure required to obtain a Patent in any other country, and approximate cost (including Patent Agents' fees) is £35 per Patent per country, but this, of course, varies, also the conditions granted.