This message actually made me mad enough to register so that I could reply...
Of course Edison made employees sign away their rights to inventions that they created while working for him. It is called "work for hire", and every research organiztion in the US today has the same policy. Why would Edison (or 3M or Microsoft for that matter) pay someone a salary, and not expect to reap the rewards of the new inventions that the EMPLOYEES discovered? The hundreds of researchers worked in a skunkworks (much like you can see today at Boeing, Apple, Xerox, or any other company engaged in research) whose sole intent is to develop new technology for patent and subsequent sales.
As far as Tesla is concerned, it seems that maybe he should have been more aggressive in the IP realm, especially after he was burned the first time or two. For such a smart fellow, he sure didn't learn that lesson very well.
Welcome to the world of BUSINESS! It seems like a lot of the posters here need smaked up side the head with this clue stick...
DAMN
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So, since you left your first job you can now really say that you don't do SQuAT?
This message actually made me mad enough to register so that I could reply... Of course Edison made employees sign away their rights to inventions that they created while working for him. It is called "work for hire", and every research organiztion in the US today has the same policy. Why would Edison (or 3M or Microsoft for that matter) pay someone a salary, and not expect to reap the rewards of the new inventions that the EMPLOYEES discovered? The hundreds of researchers worked in a skunkworks (much like you can see today at Boeing, Apple, Xerox, or any other company engaged in research) whose sole intent is to develop new technology for patent and subsequent sales. As far as Tesla is concerned, it seems that maybe he should have been more aggressive in the IP realm, especially after he was burned the first time or two. For such a smart fellow, he sure didn't learn that lesson very well. Welcome to the world of BUSINESS! It seems like a lot of the posters here need smaked up side the head with this clue stick... DAMN