The Original

[wesmorris]

Have you invented something to find out later it already exists? Come up with an original nickname that you find out someone else came up with independently of yourself? Did you pick it up somewhere and it just creeped into your subconscience?

For instance I would swear to you that "nerd overlord" is an idea I just came up with one afternoon as I was talking smack here on sciforums. Come to find out later, someone else came up with it on their own a while back (how far back I dunno). A couple of things fascinate me about this.

Is it my idea? (I ask both in the sense, did I come up with it or just see it somewhere else and file it)

What is the probability of combining those two words? Is it simply statistics that beat me to my own idea?

How doe this bear on intellectual property laws? Snooze you lose I suppose? Eventually won't someone own all the ideas that way?

 

[Persol]

Persol. I came up with it about 19 years ago... only to find out later on Google that it is a sunglass company which spams the web.

 

[sargentlard]

Have you invented something to find out later it already exists? Come up with an original nickname that you find out someone else came up with independently of yourself? Did you pick it up somewhere and it just creeped into your subconscience?

Only to find out my conscience was too slow and was beaten to the punch

Is it my idea? (I ask both in the sense, did I come up with it or just see it somewhere else and file it)

Yes...to me it is since it was origintaed solely through your efforts with no prior knowledge of a similar or exact idea having been thought of already and put into use no matter to what degree.

What is the probability of combining those two words? Is it simply statistics that beat me to my own idea?

Ergo it was your idea, simply rendered useless (Well, that depends on how you plan to apply the idea) by satistics.

How does this bear on intellectual property laws? Snooze you lose I suppose? Eventually won't someone own all the ideas that way?

Snooze you lose - yes, unfortunetly one can not ask the previous idea to be put away or suspended simply because the other guy got their first.

No singly entitity can have a collective mass of all the ideas. If the idea can be modified to lawfully differentiate itself enough then it can coexist.

 

[Cyperium]

I've noticed these things too, in a way isn't everything influenced either by someone else or by something else you've seen happening? I guess it was your idea since you found it. Cause if you can find it then it shows that you can understand it, and if you can understand it then you could just aswell have invented it, if the conditions were right.