"Google's powerful patent search engine allows immediate access to the documents that have driven innovation for more than a century.
Pictured is Wilbur and Orville Wright's airplane, but other famous inventors are well-represented: Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison intrigue.
Looking for Sir Clive Sinclair's cool but commercially ruinous C5 electrical vehicle, my Google-fu failed me, though I did chance across his more successful foldable bicycle. In today's business era, it's all about companies. Apple Computer offers some interesting results, but IBM is boring: one could count dynamoelectric nonmagnetic laminates as a cure for sleeplessness.
Let's cut to the chase. Flying machines of every description take off, but perpetual motion machines stay grounded. Patent officials throw crazy patent claims in the trash nowadays, but try zero-point energy to get modern krankery, that being a code phrase which is to the old perpetuum mobile as Intelligent Design is to Creationism. World War II computers rule -- as do their earlier counterparts.
Makeblog found the original patents for the Transformers. Alas, no Gobots.
Of course, there is the inevitable focus on genitalia, male and female, ranging from sex toys to cleansing devices that no sane person would allow near their vitals. Don't miss the opportunities for improvement.
Last (and first), come innovations prior to 1850: magical, mystical devices ranging from terrifying coathangers to devices used to mercilessly torture vegetables.
So, what have you found?"
