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Vaguely related: I own a fun little board game called U.S. Patent No. 1 (made by Cheapass Games), which is obviously inspired by the story of Alexander Graham B
by rmunn 1y ago
Vaguely related: I own a fun little board game called U.S. Patent No. 1 (made by Cheapass Games), which is obviously inspired by the story of Alexander Graham Bell beating Elisha Gray to the patent office by just a few hours. In that game, you play as one of several people throughout history who have invented a time machine, and all of you are racing to get to the U.S. Patent office first (i.e. the minute it opens), so that your time machine can hold the coveted U.S. Patent Number 1.
This has almost nothing to do with the article, of course. :-)
- pinkmuffinere 1y agoThe game concept sounds very fun! Would you not just travel back in time to get there first though? Hoping that kind it twist is in the spirit of the game…
- rmunn 1y agoYes, that is the entire point of the game. All of you are from different periods in history, and you're all traveling back in time to the first day the U.S. Patent Office opens, in order to get the very first patent. But of course since you're all time travelers aiming for the same point in time, you have to interfere with each other in order to actually be the "first" to arrive. It gets very silly.
- 1317 1y agoI was curious about the actual patent no.1: The first US patent "was granted to Samuel Hopkins for a process of making potash, an ingredient used in fertilizer on July 31." US Patent No.1 "was granted to Senator John Ruggles for a traction wheel for steam locomotives on July 13. The 9,957 patents granted before the numbering system are now known as the X-patents." ref: https://www.uspto.gov/patents/milestones https://www.uspto.gov/patents/milestones