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Originally Posted by Kuan
My wife is on the patent comittee where she works. She says once you have released it into public use it's considered "prior art" hence cannot be patented.
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Any idea how hard and fast this rule is? It would be really hard for anyone to track down the prior existance of this device, at least from my releasing it to the public. Maybe someone else has spread it around a little more, who knows. The Guild of American Luthiers is a fairly esoteric organization. Not too widely know.
I've done web searches for "curve cutting bandsaw fence" with no results. Likewise for the patent office search function.