The Christian Science Monitor has an interesting article today entitled Better Mousetrap Builders, covering the exploits of "garage" inventors. According to the Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), of the 164,000 utility patents granted last year, some ten percent came from these private inventors.
Has anyone out there privately invented and patented something? I've got a few ideas I'm working on, but I'm not sharing until proof of concept / patent applications are finished.