Inventing With the Stars

What would-be innovators can learn from celebrity patent holders

by Elias L. Schilowitz

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US Magazine has a section called "Just Like Us!" that showcases celebrities who are unwittingly photographed doing chores readers recognize from their own, less glamorous existences. "Britney carries groceries!" "J-Lo changes diapers!"

We all know that by dint of their fame and fortune, these stars are nothing like us at all. Here's another way some stars are different: They're inventors, too. When they're not at center stage, screen or limelight, they're inventing things and getting patents on the handiwork.

Some celebrities enjoy a reputation as being cerebral, and the fact that they hold patents should come as little surprise. Take astronaut Buzz Aldrin, the second man to set foot on the moon, who holds several patents related to space travel. Less anticipated are celebrities in the mold of Neil Young, who moonlights as a model train inventor and enthusiast (Unknown Legend, indeed).

Even as their inventions distinguish stars all the more, they provide some important lessons for the would-be inventor in everyone.

•Score by playing defense. At their core, patents are a defensive mechanism. They prevent other people from doing what you are doing, at least for a limited time. Large, technology-based corporations such as IBM (IBM) know this well and amass huge patent portfolios to maintain their competitive advantage and keep competitors at bay. Apparently, Michael Jackson knows this, too.

In the music video and live performances for his hit Smooth Criminal, Jackson, while flanked by dancing mobsters, suddenly starts leaning at an impossible angle (demonstrated at the 3:50 point at www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wgS5PNTvgg). Many wondered, "Is it a camera trick?" Had Jackson unleashed another amazing dance move, on par with the Moonwalk? Turns out, it was the shoes.

Jackson patented a "method and means for creating [an] anti-gravity illusion." The simple but ingenious idea underlying the dance move is to have the dancer wear special shoes with a slot in each heel. The stage has a small knob that fits in the slot when the shoe slides over it, much like a chain-door lock. The dancer is then effectively mounted to the floor and can lean at angles that are not otherwise physically possible (if you watch closely in the video referenced above, the dancer on the far right of the screen gets his heel stuck while removing his shoe after performing the patented maneuver).

The value of Jackson's patent was not in the potential sales of his gravity defying shoes. Rather, the value to Jackson was that no one could perform the same move in the same way until the patent expired. In other words, he used the patent defensively to prevent others from performing one of his signature dance moves. History seems to have proven this true as the dance move remains closely associated with him.

•Improve on existing technology. Just because someone has a patent on a mousetrap, it doesn't mean you can't invent an improved version. An improvement is every bit as patentable as the underlying technology. Consider famed Hollywood actress, Hedy Lamarr.

Lamarr was best known as a leading Hollywood actress of the early and mid-twentieth century for her roles in movies such as Samson and Delilah and Ziegfeld Girl. She also happens to have invented an important communication technology that is still used by the military.

Lamarr's first husband (of six) was a leading manufacturer of armaments and military aircraft in pre-WWII Germany. Apparently having learned from him, Lamarr came up with an idea for a "frequency hopping" technology for controlling torpedoes. At that time, radio control of torpedoes was already known. The problem was preventing someone from discovering the control frequency and jamming the signal.

Lamarr's improvement was to have the transmitter send signals while "hopping" from frequency to frequency in quick succession.