G'day joy ride.
I'm trying to get my head around patents, the Wrights and their lack of commercial success. Maybe you can help.
From what I've read, holding a patent doesn't guarantee automatic protection? This seems to be true even back in the days of the Wright's and they must have known this as well? Now at times here we've mentioned the Wright's "secret squirrel" phase and simply put it down to keeping a lid on their discoveries until the patent came through. Simplex puts it down to lies - they never achieved flight till 1908 - hence this thread.
But this patent of theirs (for their control system) was approved in Belgium, France and Great Britain in
1904. So why didn't they then go abroad and start flogging them off?
According to one author, despite the patent approval, the Wright's held a firm belief that..."the wisest course of action was to reveal as little as possible
until a sales contract was in their hands. They had to sell their aeroplane
without showing anybody". And the Wright's felt they had more than enough time to do this, believing they had a five-year technological lead over everyone (they completely underestimated the opposition).
So, why did they think that this commercial tactic was "the wisest course of action?"
Now, how hard would that gave been back then? Be like trying to sell a flying saucer today?
(Pssst, wanna buy a flying saucer mate, no demonstration and I want the money up front!
)
