How can I obtain the earliest possible date to be covered by patent protection?
File a patent application as soon as possible and immediately begin using the notice “patent pending” on any products incorporating the invention. Your patent application is published 2 years after your filing, unless it becomes abandoned before then, but only if you have not requested upon filing that it not be published. To request that it not be published, you have to state that you don’t intend to file an application for a foreign patent. One reason for not wanting a patent application published may be that you, the inventor, want to keep your competitors in the dark as long as possible so they don’t start looking for a way around your pending patent. Another reason may be that you fear your patent application may be finally rejected, and if it is, you may want to let it thereafter become abandoned and thereby remain a trade secret with you. But if you don’t care about what happens should your patent become abandoned, and you’re not worried about early countermoves by the competiti
