"Giving away secrets" of electronics?

[tom66]

On the contrary, people should be penalized for being so slow and inefficient in their work. They should lose out to people who can develop the same products faster, more efficiently, and at lower cost. Everyone benefits from this, especially consumers, who can pay lower prices.

Indeed.  And you should be able to patent something if you can, say, fit the description of the invention and claims on two whole pages of A4, with a further four pages for diagrams only. 

Patents nowadays are so complicated that it is essentially impossible to make anything without possibly infringing a sub-claim of an extremely broad patent issued 10 years ago, never used, and sold on to a patent troll.

I'd also change the legal system for patent lawsuits where the loser in the suit pays the legal fees of the company/individual they sue (currently, each pay their own), which would dissuade trolling.

I'd also like to see patents released if no commercial use of the patent can be demonstrated after say 10 years but admit that's hard to enforce.

[niconiconi]

On the contrary, people should be penalized for being so slow and inefficient in their work. They should lose out to people who can develop the same products faster, more efficiently, and at lower cost. Everyone benefits from this, especially consumers, who can pay lower prices.

Patents nowadays are so complicated that it is essentially impossible to make anything without possibly infringing a sub-claim of an extremely broad patent issued 10 years ago, never used, and sold on to a patent troll.

*cough* *cough* US software patents... have some of the most notorious examples.

[jonpaul]

Bonjour a tous: I have a lot of experience in this! A moment please to clarify some confusion:

Copyright: .  A work of art, music, text, books, etc. Fair use doctrine allows republication and copy use if credit is granted to the (C) owner or if the work is modified.
Life is long but not unlimited

Trademark: The words or appearance of a distinctive mark to distinguish uniquelt the product or service eg Coca-Cola and the unique logo. Never expires!

Patent:   One definition is  new combination of existing components  that achieves a new, useful  and unexpected  result.
See USC 35 for definitions and law.
99.999 % of all patents are worthless, never enforced or licensed.
Notice that patents are regional or national:The  USA or EU patent  can be enforced if the device or invention is made, sold or used in the region eg USA or EU. BUT  is NOT enforceable outside the region, eg in China,
20 yrs validity.
A tiny fraction of patents are very valuable think of Ray DOLBY.

Hope that you find this useful!

Bon Journee,

Jon

PS:  since 1970s, we invented,   patented  Pro Se (no lawyer) seven patents.
One in  1990s was negotiated or  litigated 160 times, in my favor.
$ went  to lawyers, licensing firms or co inventors!

[jpanhalt]

Its bare basic , “electrician level” electronics, but tomorrow, I am being taken to their customer, to answer questions about “giving away secrets”…in relation to these bog standard hard switched converters.

It's now a day after "tomorrow."   How did it go?

[pcprogrammer]

Now he has to call Liam Neeson, because he has been TAKEN to the customer

[Kasper]

Maybe he's not allowed to tell us what happened, it's secret.

[tggzzz]

I'm disappointed. treez/faringdon hasn't "thanked" my posts. Whatever is the world coming to?!

[IanB]

I'm disappointed. treez/faringdon hasn't "thanked" my posts. Whatever is the world coming to?!

He was probably arrested for contravening the Official Secrets Act and will never be seen again 

[SiliconWizard]

I dunno, while he tends to run in circles with his topics, I usually at least get the idea behind them.
For this one, not so much.

Was it about having having to fix lame SMPS designs?
Was it about managers thinking that basic, datasheet SMPS designs were trade secrets?
And how was the OP involved apart from working on fixing designs? Was he accused of giving away secrets? If so, to whom?
Finally, what was the link with all the design work being outsourced to asian countries?

Perplexed. The good thing with those unclear topics is that everyone can interpret them as they see fit and ramble on about one specific point that may not even have been exposed in the original post.

[coppercone2]

i think patents have their place but people are mad greedy with schematics and parts list etc. At some point you are just trying to kill the little guy, and its mad annoying to have to confer with companies over obvious shit that is obscured to certify/validate/confirm/ensure the use of a product. talk about delays & overhead.................. people avoid doing tons of useful stuff because of all the bull shit

great way to employ telephone and email fact finders though. Think being part of something big helps? No, they just wanna milk the budget even more. If you imagine a task like a car going down a road, usually the 'fog' caused by 'protection' adds a ton of dinks and dents that need expensive bodywork to repair. Oh I only hit 6 mail boxes this time, and thats just for lab work. but on the other hand artificial barriers that make progress slow make work easy. What are you doing? Waiting on someone, duh! company owner ends up paying, and its super easy to prove you are innocent too, because its always happening, not like you are even lying, and usually the risk of making a random decision has grievous consequences. (at your own risk, no one wants to be associated with that decision). But on the flip side there are often great ideas that get immediately shot down because simple stuff becomes too complicated because of this, so enjoy the general mediocrity (might get around this with skill & talent) .

[temperance]

What a walls of text just to answer one of those posts by you know who. And the directions the discussions are being taken. F must have a good laugh.

Just do a job search in England. Some websites list over 500 power electronics engineering jobs. But upon close inspection it seems they are mostly looking for engineers who want to trade their secrets with the far east.


Grow up.

[pcprogrammer]

I'm disappointed. treez/faringdon hasn't "thanked" my posts. Whatever is the world coming to?!

Yeah, what is up with that. Normally a for sure way to get a thanks from Faringdon, no matter what you post

[tom66]

He was probably arrested for contravening the Official Secrets Act and will never be seen again 

It's worse.  The Chinese were so upset that he kept calling out their espionage on such proprietary, UK-invented power supply architectures like flyback and forward converters, that they've put a hit out on him.  He's now in hiding, always looking over his shoulder, waiting for the coldness of the assassin's gun at every waking moment.

[coppercone2]

with the chinese police stations fiasco, its more likely then you think. The way that some people were putting it, it did seem that if you some how get in the way of a chinese company with ties to the CCP (like friends) they might go after you. Every time there is some kind of government authorize/sponsored political related muscling happening, you can be assured that for a price, you can get something on the side related to business.

I think it would need to be a little more specific then flyback converter and involve ALOT of money though (unless its government work, but thats a whole different story)... tldr: gangsters exist. While somewhat annoying, I don't want gangsters to be after forum members? I mean its just street lights.

[jpanhalt]

He's alive!
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/manufacture/how-soft-is-this-gap-pad/?topicseen

My guess is that this thread was started as his version of a joke.

[langwadt]

My guess is that this thread was started as his version of a joke.

isn't all his threads?

[eti]

My guess is that this thread was started as his version of a joke.

isn't all his threads?

Jokes are good. They cause great joy and lower one’s blood pressure. I find the excessive, pedantic rigidity of the perceived “engineer mindset” on here, claustrophobic and stifling at times.

There’s more to life than electronics. Have a laugh, it’s a good tonic and you’ll live longer.

[tggzzz]

I find the excessive, pedantic rigidity of the perceived “engineer mindset” on here, claustrophobic and stifling at times.

And yet you keep coming here.

[thm_w]

Jokes are good. They cause great joy and lower one’s blood pressure. I find the excessive, pedantic rigidity of the perceived “engineer mindset” on here, claustrophobic and stifling at times.

There’s more to life than electronics. Have a laugh, it’s a good tonic and you’ll live longer.

The intent of this forum is to be electronics specific, the majority of us agree on that purpose.
If you want less engineering mindset, maybe check out arduino/adafruit/etc forum.
If you want something other than electronics, check out some of these forums, or go outside.   

[jpanhalt]

I'm disappointed. treez/faringdon hasn't "thanked" my posts. Whatever is the world coming to?!

Hey, lick your wounds.  I got a "like" here: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/renewable-energy/whats-wrong-with-smd-fets-on-pcb-lying-on-top-of-metal-plateheatsink/msg4546229/#msg4546229

There was a time when I really felt for Faringdon and spent hours trying to give him advice based on my experiences.  All of that was ignored, similar to another frequent poster from the UK here.  I don't think he cares and apparently the UK has enough support services that he isn't starving to death.  That's the one fear my mom instilled in me from a very early age, as ridiculous as it may seem today.*

*She was a teenager in a large immigrant family during the Great Depression.  Everyone had to work.

[tggzzz]

I'm disappointed. treez/faringdon hasn't "thanked" my posts. Whatever is the world coming to?!

Hey, lick your wounds.  I got a "like" here: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/renewable-energy/whats-wrong-with-smd-fets-on-pcb-lying-on-top-of-metal-plateheatsink/msg4546229/#msg4546229

Oh, I'm revelling in it

Thanking everybody cheapens any value there might be in saying thanks.

[ogden]

It's quite the insult to call an electronics engineer an "electrical engineer". I used to detest that when I was young and insecure. We are all equally valuable and skilled in/interested in different areas. It doesn't matter to me now, but as a teenager? Oh boy did it annoy me!!

I'm not quite sure why? Electrical engineering relates to the engineering of systems that involve electricity. I'm rather sure that electronic circuits use electricity, so they are electrical engineering.

With same success you can label every surgeon as butcher because both are cutting flesh.

[eti]

Jokes are good. They cause great joy and lower one’s blood pressure. I find the excessive, pedantic rigidity of the perceived “engineer mindset” on here, claustrophobic and stifling at times.

There’s more to life than electronics. Have a laugh, it’s a good tonic and you’ll live longer.

The intent of this forum is to be electronics specific, the majority of us agree on that purpose.
If you want less engineering mindset, maybe check out arduino/adafruit/etc forum.
If you want something other than electronics, check out some of these forums, or go outside.   

It’s an intelligent person who is both engineering minded whilst being fun and light hearted. It seems rare and that’s a pity. I’m well aware this is an engineering forum and don’t need to be told that, but having a laugh seems long forgotten by most. 🤣

[jpanhalt]

Thanking everybody cheapens any value there might be in saying thanks.

You mean its less than zero?  I won't stand for that.  One of the things I like about this site is the complete irrelevance of "like" scores.

[Andy Watson]

One of the things I like about this site is the complete irrelevance of "like" scores.

Oh, hang-on-a-mo, did I just "like" that?