How Low?

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Originally Posted by shhhli

Patent a bp. Yes, that is it. Even though that makes absolutly no sense. How in the world can you set up a patent that if the animal is redistributed that it can only be sold at X. Genius. Even if someone else Wild-catches the same morph.

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A (legal) agrument might be able to be made for designer morphs....they dont occur in nature. Then a licensed agreement to breed would be require from the owner of the intellectual property. It a bit of a stetch though.....

For a patent to be issued on a pet, it would likely have to have some genetic engineering in it.

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

For a patent to be issued on a pet, it would likely have to have some genetic engineering in it.

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i.e. the GloFish

http://www.glofish.com/about.asp

" Why are GloFish® the only fluorescent fish that can be sold in the United States? Because fluorescent fish are unique, their sale is covered by a substantial number of patents and pending patent applications. The providers of GloFish® fluorescent fish, 5-D Tropical and Segrest Farms, are the only distributors that have the necessary licenses to produce and market fluorescent fish within the United States. The production of fluorescent fish by any other party, or the sale of any fluorescent fish not originally distributed by 5-D Tropical or Segrest Farms, is strictly prohibited."

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

i.e. the GloFish

http://www.glofish.com/about.asp

" Why are GloFish® the only fluorescent fish that can be sold in the United States? Because fluorescent fish are unique, their sale is covered by a substantial number of patents and pending patent applications. The providers of GloFish® fluorescent fish, 5-D Tropical and Segrest Farms, are the only distributors that have the necessary licenses to produce and market fluorescent fish within the United States. The production of fluorescent fish by any other party, or the sale of any fluorescent fish not originally distributed by 5-D Tropical or Segrest Farms, is strictly prohibited."

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Mendel's Balls, if you dont quit busting my chops i swear.
Honestly though, you always have some good stuff to share- you're the most tenacious researcher i've seen in a while.

I see how it could be done, but some of these morphs IE pastel were found in the wild first by Graziani and then by NERD. Would they then need to patent each individual line seperatly and give them seperate names? What about if i took a Graziani patented pastel and bred it to say a clown. Would the patent still hold some work with the babies that are pastel with clown het? its a different animal genetically....

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Originally Posted by shhhli

Mendel's Balls, if you dont quit busting my chops i swear.
Honestly though, you always have some good stuff to share- you're the most tenacious researcher i've seen in a while.

I see how it could be done, but some of these morphs IE pastel were found in the wild first by Graziani and then by NERD. Would they then need to patent each individual line seperatly and give them seperate names? What about if i took a Graziani patented pastel and bred it to say a clown. Would the patent still hold some work with the babies that are pastel with clown het? its a different animal genetically....

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I'm no lawyer butI only think that you could possibly do it with a desinger morph...clowns are base morphs right?

My general point was just because something is living doesnt mean you can't patent it.

And this licensing agreement stuff may not fit with a good (small) business plan...but who knows almost anything can be coporatized eventually.

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Originally Posted by Mendel's Balls

I'm no lawyer butI only think that you could possibly do it with a desinger morph...clowns are base morphs right?

My general point was just because something is living doesnt mean you can't patent it.

And this licensing agreement stuff may not fit with a good (small) business plan...but who knows almost anything can be coporatized eventually.

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I'll poke around Lexis-Nexus tomorrow and see what similar cases, if any, are out there.

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Originally Posted by shhhli

Patent a bp. Yes, that is it. Even though that makes absolutly no sense. How in the world can you set up a patent that if the animal is redistributed that it can only be sold at X. Genius. Even if someone else Wild-catches the same morph.




Like I said this is done everyday in the plant world. My real job is as a plant broker. We have tons of folks that travel the world searching for new and exciting plants, then we have those like me that that do crosses and breed new plants. Once a plant has been patented nobody, by law can propagate that plant without paying a royalty to the breeder/finder. Almost all those pretty little plants you see in the garden centers these days have had a royalty of $.01 to $5.00+++ paid on them to the breeder. The average is about $.40 a plant. You sell a few million and things add up quick. Just my firm alone sells more than a million of one variety and there are more than 50 brokers just on the Mid-Atlantic states. We also have what we call the 'flower police' and these are agents the check to see if growers are paying royalties, if they are propagating any plant material. We also have licensed propagators that are the only ones legally aloud to propagate certain plants. A great example of this is the 'Proven Winners' line of plants. www.provenwinners.com There are only 3 greenhouses in the whole country that can propagate their plants. So a BP breeder could protect their lines if they wanted to. And yes, you can patent DNA.


The real question comes in when you barrow another breeders DNA to create a new morph. You can protect this with a patent but most just try to keep their projects ahead of everyone else’s.

I really don't want to see this happen in the reptile world. It could kill some really neat programs out of greed (as I have seen happen in the plant world).
I still ask the question of 'How many $10,000 - $30,000 snakes can possibly be sold?' That’s the average yearly household income for most Americans. Study, after study, have shown that the true collectors & hobbyist of the USA are middle to low income households. I think the post about how there may be 5000 buyers for these high-end morphs, is along the lines of what I am saying. But I think the # of buyers for the high priced market is a lot lower. Plus unless you are the seller or buyer, you really don't know what the snakes are really selling for.


As for what this breeder did or 'POSTED' we really don't know why. Can anybody even confirm that the snakes were even sold???? or how many????? and I mean CONFIRM as in seen the snakes leave the breeder to the customer. You can do anything you want on paper or by phone, but until the product has been delivered the transaction is not complete.

That being said...I don't think the patent idea would be a good one at all. The guys over in Africa would be the first to "own" many newly discovered morphs and if you think morphs are expensive now, imagine having to send a check to Noah everytime you sold a Yb, pastel, hypo, whatever. The breeders wouldn't just take the hit, they'd just pass it on to their buyers.

Yes, its not very plausable and far fetched atleast. Not to say someone with a penchant for greed and no interest in snakes couldn't catch on. But that's just some crazy novel idea.

I think it seems pretty impossible for patents to work in regards to bps. Not that the concept isn't plausible but how exactly are you going to enforce the paying a roylaties when the bp market is so highly traded. With new comers all the time, trades highly routine practice, and many operations running out of people's homes. Seems like there would be a lot of room for people to deal behind closed doors to avoid paying royalties. Unless there were authorized distributers but that would completely kill the spirit of the hobby.

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Originally Posted by jbkd

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Like I said this is done everyday in the plant world. My real job is as a plant broker. We have tons of folks that travel the world searching for new and exciting plants, then we have those like me that that do crosses and breed new plants. Once a plant has been patented nobody, by law can propagate that plant without paying a royalty to the breeder/finder. Almost all those pretty little plants you see in the garden centers these days have had a royalty of $.01 to $5.00+++ paid on them to the breeder. The average is about $.40 a plant. You sell a few million and things add up quick. Just my firm alone sells more than a million of one variety and there are more than 50 brokers just on the Mid-Atlantic states. We also have what we call the 'flower police' and these are agents the check to see if growers are paying royalties, if they are propagating any plant material. We also have licensed propagators that are the only ones legally aloud to propagate certain plants. A great example of this is the 'Proven Winners' line of plants. www.provenwinners.com There are only 3 greenhouses in the whole country that can propagate their plants. So a BP breeder could protect their lines if they wanted to. And yes, you can patent DNA.


The real question comes in when you barrow another breeders DNA to create a new morph. You can protect this with a patent but most just try to keep their projects ahead of everyone else’s.

I really don't want to see this happen in the reptile world. It could kill some really neat programs out of greed (as I have seen happen in the plant world).
I still ask the question of 'How many $10,000 - $30,000 snakes can possibly be sold?' That’s the average yearly household income for most Americans. Study, after study, have shown that the true collectors & hobbyist of the USA are middle to low income households. I think the post about how there may be 5000 buyers for these high-end morphs, is along the lines of what I am saying. But I think the # of buyers for the high priced market is a lot lower. Plus unless you are the seller or buyer, you really don't know what the snakes are really selling for.

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Its called the tragedy of the anticommons