What Would You Do With a New Form of Encryption?

Kip Knight asks: "I've been sitting on an invention for six months now. I'm debating whether to 'give it to the world' or patent it. I would obviously like to feed my family on the fruits of my endeavour but don't see much hope in the open source route. My invention improves upon the 80 year old One-Time Pad encryption turning it into a 'Many-Time Pad'. Since I haven't got my export license to speak about the details yet, I won't describe further. The advantages are proof (i.e. unbreakable) against brute force attacks and known-plaintext attacks (unlike the OTP). The disadvantage is carrying around a very large digital key (which could easily fit on one of those USB memory key fobs). My question is this: Could I sell enough $10 shareware GPG extensions to compensate for not locking in 20 years of patent protection (and the $20,000 to patent it)?" While the claims made by the submittor have yet to withstand the crucial test of time (and prying eyes), if you had developed a new form of encryption, what would you do?

Comments

Re:learn to play the patent game

[gorilla]

The postmark is sufficient proof of the date.

No it isn't. How do you prove you didn't mail yourself an empty envelope, and at a later time put the letter in it and seal the envelope.

What would I do with this new encryption?

[Laplace]

I would take the process and print it out. Hell, I'd make lots of copies. Then I would put that stack of encryption goodness next to my toilet and use it to wipe my ass after taking a shit.