New to the Boards

Blackbird230

Welcome to the board! I used to quilt a lot until I got into a small apartment and couldn't set up my machine.

Do you like horses at all? Have you ever ridden?

thetimewillcome

@lalalaurita

The 4th of July. Who doesn't like fireworks?

I like gardening, but I've been in an apartment for a couple years now. Luckily, my SO's family has a big garden on their property. YAY tomatoes!

I love breakfast food. My favorite is homemade coffee cake with a big glass of milk.

How's this?

thetimewillcome

@GoldenPenguin

I am a sports fan. I'm a lifelong Dallas Cowboys fan. I currently live in Pittsburgh, so anyone who knows much about sports, knows that it doesn't work well. But I own it

I'm also a Buccos (Pirates-baseball) fan. I liked them when they sucked...oh wait...I mean, I like them now

thetimewillcome

@Blackbird230

I grew up on a farm and we had horses, so I rode fairly frequently. I haven't ridden in a couple years, cause my folks sold the farm, but even if they hadn't I only get back there over Christmas usually so I wouldn't be doing much riding then anyway.

ShallowSeas

Welcome!!
 
What's your favorite song from the 90's?

Who is your celebrity crush?

Swazzle

thetimewillcome said:

@GoldenPenguin

I am a sports fan. I'm a lifelong Dallas Cowboys fan. I currently live in Pittsburgh, so anyone who knows much about sports, knows that it doesn't work well. But I own it

I'm also a Buccos (Pirates-baseball) fan. I liked them when they sucked...oh wait...I mean, I like them now

GoldenPenguin

thetimewillcome said:

@GoldenPenguin

I am a sports fan. I'm a lifelong Dallas Cowboys fan. I currently live in Pittsburgh, so anyone who knows much about sports, knows that it doesn't work well. But I own it

I'm also a Buccos (Pirates-baseball) fan. I liked them when they sucked...oh wait...I mean, I like them now

OOF. It's a good thing we like you for other reasons.  

Pepperally

@thetimewillcome-I'm also in Pittsburgh. Did you go to law school here? My brother went to Duquesne for law school.

BreMR

@thetimewilltell  We are now besties, and I'm no longer alone!!! 

thetimewillcome

severmilli12 I'm a country music fan. Well, I'm a music in general fan, but if I have control of the radio then it will probably be country. But assuming the question is more of a general song that everyone knows, my favorite song is probably "Madly Truly Deeply" by Savage Garden.

Celebrity crush: Either Mark Wahlberg...oooo those abs or Heath Ledger (before Batman) RIP

@swazzle and @goldenpenguin I had seen a consensus on the Cowboys on another thread somewhere. That's why I didn't lead off with that. I figured I'd wait till you liked me first

@Pepperally That's where I went to law school

@BreMR YAY!!!!!

AuroraRose41

@thetimewillcome Welcome! Could I ask what you do as a patent lawyer on a day to day basis? Is is more of just reading patents and writing summaries/proposals etc, or more on the prosecution side of things (in a courtroom)?

I am currently an electrical engineer, but I am considering going to law school to become a patent attorney. I would love to know more about the field before making that jump though!

thetimewillcome

First, sorry about the length of this post.

@AuroraRose41

Generally there are two types of patent lawyers (some do both), but for the sake of clarity I'm going to break them into two groups. One type deals with patent preparation and prosecution, which isn't what most people think of when they think of prosecution. Patent preparation is getting a disclosure from an inventor (sometimes a couple sentences...sometimes pages with powerpoints and stuff) and then actually creating the patent. This includes drafting the claims and specification. The claims are what you are saying you are inventing and are in patent-speak. Once you get a hang of the lingo, then they actually make sense. The specification is all the other stuff which explains the invention to lay-people. (This sounds kind of daunting, but it is actually easier then I expected. It takes me about a day to draft a patent with 3 sentences of disclosure and a phone call.)

The patent prosecution (a part of the first type, but the paragraph was getting long) is when the USPTO responds to your patent application and says that it isn't allowable for one reason or another (too vague, there is prior art, etc.). You then usually amend your claims slightly (just so the examiner feels better) and tell them how they are wrong. The substance of the argument is usually a page or two. It looks like way more because there is a lot of boilerplate stuff, but it is copy and paste.

The other type of patent attorney is one that does patent litigation (this is what you were thinking of on the prosecution side). This type of attorney does kind of what you would expect: makes arguments to tell you why someone is infringing their patent. This includes writing memos and briefs (both not as short as they sound).

The law firm I'm with does more of the preparation and prosecution. They have only done a couple litigation things, but they are apparently quite good at that too. I actually really enjoy my job. I enjoyed being an engineer (also electrical), but this is different. I found that with engineering I was doing the same thing over and over again....literally the same thing. I think without a Master's I wasn't going to be able to actually create something new. Here, while the idea is the same, the subject matter is always different. For example, I've done patents on things from dog food (not kidding) to some virtual calculator thing. Obviously, I do not specialize in dog food, so I was kind of concerned with not knowing the subject matter, but it really comes down to whether you can visualize it enough to write about it. It helps that you can always call the inventors when you have questions.

I personally didn't really want to end up in a courtroom. I can be very eloquent and I am well spoken and my arguments are thought out. However, when I'm in front of people I don't know and they are literally judging me, I get so nervous that I get dumb. Don't get me wrong, I say lots of stupid things, but usually its in front of friends and/or family, so they know that I'm really not that stupid.

If you don't like writing, this is definitely not a field for you. With either type of attorney, you'll write a lot, especially just starting out.

blabla89

thetimewillcome said:

@lalalaurita

The 4th of July. Who doesn't like fireworks?

I like gardening, but I've been in an apartment for a couple years now. Luckily, my SO's family has a big garden on their property. YAY tomatoes!

I love breakfast food. My favorite is homemade coffee cake with a big glass of milk.

How's this?

I love homegrown tomatoes and your gif is great. You can join the club

thetimewillcome

Oh one more thing:

The field CAN be lucrative. Many people I know always comment about me getting such a huge pay raise (I don't tell people what I make). Well, as you probably know, you can make fairly good money as an engineer. I didn't get much a pay raise when I switched. However, I COULD have even as an entry level attorney. Some of the things that I decided were important to me made it so I ended up at about the same pay. First, I didn't want to work for a big firm. If you work for a larger firm you can make more. The issue with that is that you 1) end up being their slave and work 70 hour weeks and 2) you never touch anything of substance until about year 5. At my job, I work 40 hours a week and I'm actually drafting patents (I've been with them for less than a year).

AuroraRose41

@thetimewillcome that is the most useful information that I have found so far on any of this. Thank you so much! The company that I currently work for as an engineer makes most of its money on its patents, and actually has a training program that I am looking into. As a result, I think that I would be doing some litigation and some patent preparation/prosecution (sorry for not knowing the correct terms!).  I believe this, because I am in a field where well known companies (that I won't name) are very sue happy when it comes to their patents, and everyone not living under a rock hears about the lawsuits. I don't think I would mind being in a court room, but also wanted to know what the non litigation side of things was like.

Fortunately, I love to write, and love reading technical documentation. I was always the writer in the group during my EE labs in college, and many a TA mentioned that I was the best technical writer in the class by far. I can normally write an entire 4-5 page technical paper in a matter of hours, so I am very efficient at it too. This is why I believe that I would excel in this field, but wanted to make sure that it was truly something that I wanted to do.

As for the engineering, I am currently a test engineer, and honestly thought I would enjoy the position more. It does seem quite repetitive, and most of the time I just send a lot of emails arguing with designers that their circuit designs don't work properly, waiting around for hardware to become available to test, and running software programs to test hardware. Even though my manager is encouraging me to get my MSEE, I don't see my job changing much with that degree (others on my team do the same work that I do and have that degree), and don't think that I want to spend the rest of my career in this position.

You have given me a lot to think about, and I think I am going to start studying for the LSAT while waiting for my hardware to become available .

ETF: spelling is hard without coffee.

thetimewillcome

@AuroraRose41

Don't worry about the terms, I was just correcting you in case someone talked about it you would have an idea what they were talking about. To be honest, I had no idea either when I started.

You sound like me with regards to the writing part...and the engineering part.

Not to push you one way or the other, but I think if you did get into it, you'd probably like it. All of this is based off a couple posts, so you can take that with however much salt you want to  

Feel free to PM me or ask me more questions as you come up with them if you would like.

FoxandBunny

@thetimewillcome - Those look great! I think I'm making my first one a little complex. I'm doing a swoon pattern which is kind of a pain, especially when the sewing machine is being a brat and breaking threads every 6 inches, but that's for another time. I wish I had more time to work on them. It is quite addicting, isn't it?

thetimewillcome

@FoxandBunny

The white squares in the first two are all hand stitched. Meaning, I did all the needlework for them. I thought, this will be cool. I guess you have no idea how long and complicated things are until you commit to them. I probably wouldn't have made them my first ones if I would have realized how much time I'd have into them. But it is so addicting.

Yours sounds like it will be pretty when you get done with it. When you finish, I'd like to see pictures. Good luck with your sewing machine. They can be oh so great...when they are working, but such a pain when they don't want to work.

FoxandBunny

Thanks! Good luck with all of yours as well. They are a lot of work, but it is very rewarding when you finish. I have one block done already, so I'll try to attach a picture of it. 

The sewing machine is amazing when it works and a pain when it doesn't. It makes everything go so much faster though. 

The first picture shows the colors correctly and the second one shows it all sewn together.

thetimewillcome

@foxandbunny That looks like it is going to be awesome. I love the colors you used. I don't know why but it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy when I find another person who quilts (or does any of those "old" crafts) who isn't 80.

FoxandBunny

@thetimewillcome - Thank you so much! Every block is going to be a different color to be like a scrap quilt. I am far from 80 so I'm glad I can make you feel all warm and fuzzy! It's nice to know that there is someone here who does it as well and I'm not alone in liking these kind of "old" crafts, as you put it. I wish more people did it because it's such an awesome skill to have.