Very Cool Scot! There is such a need, I hope this goes over well...

TW,
While the Bubble Buoy or "Jellyfish" looks like a real possibility I just want to say THANKYOU VERY MUCH for all the work you did relating to the Waterfilled Buoys. In the last two years the skiers on our lake have hit them numerous times and kept on skiing. We settled on slightly more than half filled with the buoy sitting just slightly below the equator. It has given all of us more confidence in our skiing by removing the fear factor in the back of your mind about nailing a Buoy. I have talked others into switching at their lakes also.

There is no telling how many ankles have been saved do to you shedding light on this subject and your in-depth articles and illustrations.

Once again, THANKYOU.............ED

Where can we get those things and how much?

ScotChipman wrote:

Thomas Wayne,  If you have a patent pending claim (what is the patent #?) on a buoy like the Bubble Buoy why didn't you bring it to market? Would it be because of the high costs to bring it to market and the limited sales potential? If you were in fact sitting on intellectual property that could have saved hundreds of injures would you not be liable in some way? Why would you threaten Dave Goode with a lawsuit for taking the time and high costs in bringing a new safer buoy to market that will benefit us all. It is possible that Dave Goode may never see a return on his money for this new buoy and even if he does why should he not benefit after putting up the time and effort to develop it? Is your plan now to sit and wait to see if in fact Dave Goode does turn a profit down the road then file a lawsuit and take profit after taking no initial risk in development costs? You admit that you and Dave Goode never talked so what he came up with had nothing to do with your idea. There is no reason to say "presumably believing that his brilliant mind would produce something unique that no one else could ever conceive" except to put down Dave Goode which you and a few others just love to do.

Skiboy, Not sure when they will be available or how much. You can keep checking www.goode.com or call/e-mail them.

Scot,

1)  Patent FAQ 101: a "patent#" doesn't even exist until a patent is granted... duh.

2)  I have a number of good ideas and gadgets in various stages of the patent process; no one, under any circumstances whatsoever, is under any obligation to reveal confidential information about an invention.  There's no liability AT ALL attached to not releasing a device before one wants to... duh.

3)  "Lawsuit" is a term YOU brought into this discussion, not me.  I haven't written a single thing about any "lawsuit"... duh.

4)  Yes, our plan is to now "sit and wait" - advice any competent IP attorney would give a client in our situation... duh.

5)  Where, in anything I wrote above, did you see me "admit" that Dave Goode and I have never spoken?  You should try reading posts [that you oppose] a little more carefully before flying off the handle, Scot... duh.

TW

Scot,

Our Patent Application Number is kept confidential by law, and is absolutely none of your business.  In fact no public record is made regarding any aspect of a patent claim(s) until 18 months after the final patent and accompanying claims are filed - at a minimum.  In some cases it can be years before any such information is made available to the public.  I didn't make these rules, but I am certainly bound by them AND entitled to make full use of them.

What's "right in [your] opinion" has zero meaning to me, since you make it pretty clear that your "opinion" is everyone should get on their knees and worship Dave Goode.  Under the intellectual properties laws that rule in our country, whoever first conceives an inveniton and files a record of that invention with the US government has the exclusive right to profit from that invention for up to 20 years.  I'm quite sure if Dave Goode ever bothered to patent anything you'd be the FIRST to jump up and defend HIS intellectual property rights.

Ultimately, Scot, it's not your job (or place) to fight Dave Goode's fights for him; he's a big boy and he can take care of himself.  Not everyone shares your high opinion of him, and that's something you might as well get used to because it's unlikely to change in the near future.

TW

Hey ya'll, Let us never forget that we are all a very small Family of water skiing enthusiasts. Maybe a bit Dis functional at times But, Damn the struggle and strife of these dog gone Ski forums is getting ridiculous...

Can't we agree to disagree Respectfully?

Can't everyone be entitled to His or Her own opinion?

Can't we all practice saying: Good job, Great idea, I agree with Bob, ( these are little complements...)

Come on, the World owes us Nothing! There's a Big ol' World out there that would LOVE, LOVE LOVE to cheat you, kick your a$$, shoot you, stab you, Rape you and your mother and then spit on your grave...

We, (Skiers) (Friends) (brothers)and fellow water dawgs can do Better then this! -Don't we at least owe each other that much?

Ok Wade, I won't say what I was going to say.  But TW, from now on we should just call you "DUH".  It's very appropriate.

Garn

started using the waterfilled buoys last year on our Ez-slalom course

I know some that use permanent courses with sub buoys can underinflate them and just shorten the rope, reducing the amount of buoy above the surface,  but with a portable the buoys have very little resistence from below the water.

can't see how these bubble buoys would work with a portable course, correct me if I'm wrong.  also not spending more than the $5 per ball I already do on a public course.  the polyform buoys have held up very well FWIW

I've run the water filled guys over with my ski and not had a problem, might trigger a fall, but I don't catch my ankles on them any more and am not scared of running a little closer to the ball.



just another dumb canuck

There has been quite a large blowup on several forum from TW stating that the Goode buoy appears to share features with a patent that he has already filed. It's not nearly as inflammatory as it is being made to be. 


We never did track down and flame the tar out of the guy that sued for royalties on the fin clamp patents that several manufactures utilized. We should get around to that.

HO410 wrote:

[...]
We never did track down and flame the tar out of the guy that sued for royalties on the fin clamp patents that several manufactures utilized. We should get around to that.

Paul Insensee is the name you're thinking of.  He forced an out-of-court settlement with some of the guys infringing on his fin block patent; I've spoken with Paul and he says he's completely satisfied with the settlement money.

And, to correct the slew of misinformation "david38off" just vomited into this thread, the man who invented the intermittent windshield wiper was named Bob Kearns, and he did not sue for "billions", but rather for millions.  He won that infringement suit against Ford, and they settled for slightly more than $10 million.

In his second suit, against Chrysler, he won $18.7 million (plus interest) in a successful trial.  Chrysler appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, who declined to review the case.  Ultimately, Chrysler paid Kearns approximately $30 million.

Finally, Bob Kearns lived more than a decade after Chrysler was forced to pay him the ~ $30 million in 1995;  Ford had already paid the $10 million settlement in 1991.

I followed Kearns' case(s) in the 90's and have a great deal of respect for how he stuck to his guns - as do most of my fellow inventors.

TW

Sorry Paul, your dishonest attempts to alter history with revisionist claims won't succeed.

Our original ARM-GUARD design, which is fully documented dating to 2003, contained all the minimalist aspects your first published photo (from later 2004) displayed.  In fact, we've got dated archival copies of your website on which you published that same first photo (slightly altered) several days after we released the Generation-2 ARM-GUARD.  The current inferior knock-off you now sell didn't appear until almost six weeks after the ARM-GUARD debuted.  Most importantly, we filed our patent application(s) long before our initial release.

We've provided the USPTO all the documentation we need to prove our patent application claims, and I sincerely hope we get to see you in a US courtroom (since we also can prove you've distributed your knock-off within the US).  It will be very interesting to see if you have the guts to perjure yourself under oath, especially in light of the mountain of evidence we've assembled.

I recommend you start saving up now.

TW

Last edited by Thomas Wayne (Thu, May 27, 2010 5:43 AM)

TW is right ..I was just guessing on the amt of the original suit  "billions" was just to dramatize how large the amount of the suit was.  And there is a difference between winning a lawsuit and actually getting paid any money.  I too have wikipedia and your response was pretty much taken right out of it.  I may have been mistaken about him receiving money prior to his death but had watched a documentary on it some time ago, and thought they had said he hadnt recieved money prior to his death. I should have known to get ALL the facts before posting to you.  In any event the money he did apparently recieve was a miserable fraction of what it is actually worth.  And he got it like what?? 30 yrs after the fact when he was 80?? (just guessing on the age so dont call me out on that too).  How much do you think Goode will make on the bouy?  I also see a major difference in your case and his....he apparently DID share his research with Ford / Chrysler and you apparently DID NOT share your info with GOode other than maybe a General idea of it.  I will in the future make sure to get my facts straight with you though since you apparently know everything there is to know about everything.  (Wikipedia).   It was really just to make a point as to how ridiculous your attack on Dave Goode was.  I think if I were Dave Goode I might consider suing you for slander!  I wasnt really familiar with you before, but after reading many of your posts and talking to others in the waterski community I find you to be a cancerous growth on the sport of waterskiing.  And like all cancerous growths I feel you need to be removed.  I would recommend that Wade consider terminating your privileges to post so that we can get back to constructive discussions about WATERSKIING.  I know TW will respond with some witty comeback , but I will not respond so you will be wasting post space.  I have said all I wish to say.   Thank you