Guarding against loss of patent rights

Patent rights in inventions can easily be lost by the unwary. Sending a registered letter to oneself does not establish any patent rights, or any other rights of priority, in any country of the world. There is no such thing as an international or worldwide patent. Almost anything that you do or say in public before you file an application for patent may detrimentally affect your patent rights in some country. The author briefly looks at some of the complications involved trying to obtain the exclusive right to practice your own technology, and the many the things that an inventor can do to either prevent his getting a valid patent, to lose his patent rights, or to limit the patent rights he has so laboriously won.