The following are the requirements for filing a patent:
1. Usefulness
2. Novelty: The invention must not have existed from before
3. Non-obviousness: The invention must not be obvious to those skilled in the prior art.
When filing a patent application, you are required to describe the invention in full, including the best mode.
So while a working prototype is not required, satisfying 1, 2 and 3 above is still theoretically hard and requires a lot of work for filing a good patent. The issue is that the system is abused as each one of 1, 2 and 3 are subjective more or less.
While not explicitly stated, I believe the concept described in the application must be correct [1]! Since a prototype is not required, it is sometimes the case that things that do not even work the way inventors thought get the patent granted anyways.
Finally, just for completion sake, there are things that cannot be patented like laws of physics, theorems in mathematics, and material that is a subject for copyrights instead.
[1] I am not sure of this. There may or may not be specific legal criteria on this.
>> I'm going to patent everything
See my comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5934890
The following are the requirements for filing a patent:
1. Usefulness
2. Novelty: The invention must not have existed from before
3. Non-obviousness: The invention must not be obvious to those skilled in the prior art.
When filing a patent application, you are required to describe the invention in full, including the best mode.
So while a working prototype is not required, satisfying 1, 2 and 3 above is still theoretically hard and requires a lot of work for filing a good patent. The issue is that the system is abused as each one of 1, 2 and 3 are subjective more or less.
While not explicitly stated, I believe the concept described in the application must be correct [1]! Since a prototype is not required, it is sometimes the case that things that do not even work the way inventors thought get the patent granted anyways.
Finally, just for completion sake, there are things that cannot be patented like laws of physics, theorems in mathematics, and material that is a subject for copyrights instead.
[1] I am not sure of this. There may or may not be specific legal criteria on this.