What is a Patent?
A patent is an agreement, like a contract, between you, the inventor, and the government of the United States. The consideration of the agreement is that you will disclose your idea to the general public, and after 20 years, the public will be able to consider your invention “public domain”. In return for your disclosure, the government will give you a 20 year “monopoly” on the use and sale of the idea. The word “monopoly” has a negative connotation, but is still used to describe the kind of rights that are attendant to the issuance of a patent.
Every country has its own patent system, and there is no “world patent”. The discussion in this web site will relate to the United States patent process. You can apply for patent protection in other countries. You may either file a PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty) application or you may file a patent application directly in the country in which you are attempting to secure patent protection. Each country is different, and each country requires that you secure representation in that country. If the country requires that the patent application be in the language of that country, you must then use an accepted translator to produce the application for that country.