5 Multi-Million Dollar Inventions (Nobody Really Owns)

Behind the fidget spinner is a classic sad tale of an unlucky inventor making a mistake and losing a fortune. Maybe. No one's really sure whose mind spawned these blasted things, but we do know of someone who invented a very similar type of doohickey: Florida native Catherine Hettinger. Inspired by stories of kids in Israel throwing rocks at cops and passersby, Hettinger created her imaginatively named "spinning toy" to finally give children a release that does not involving beaning strangers with chunks of mineral. Here's the prototype:

Anyone who has met a preteen in the last six months might know that that mini UFO doesn't quite look like the shape of the childproofed throwing stars that are contemporary fidget spinners. However, surely that's close enough for at least a few mildly lucrative out-of-court settlements. That is, if Hettinger still owned her invention. After successfully selling her spinning toy at arts and crafts markets across Florida (no small feat for a product not fashioned out of alligator teeth), Hettinger started suspecting she finally had a hit on her hands. Her dreams were crushed, however, when Hasbro passed on producing the toy. Crestfallen, Hettinger finally let her patent lapse in 2005, no longer able to afford to pay the $400 fee for something that would obviously never take off.

But then came 2017, the year that logic died and the spinner finally had its day, much to Hettinger's lack of gain. At least she can take some solace in how her invention would have never made her rich anyway. Even if she had stuck to her patents, it would have expired in 2014 -- so long ago that some of the people making fidget spinners today weren't even born.

However, after 50 years of aggressive advertising, King-Seeley's branding finally overtook its greed. In 1958, a company named Aladdin Industries (ironically named after a thief famous for letting things out of bottles) started selling its own vacuum flasks as "thermos bottles." King-Seeley quickly sued Aladdin for infringement, only to be told by the U.S. courts that it no longer owned its own name. Despite King-Seeley's trademark (and even hounding dictionary writers to keep its name out), the judge deemed that the thermos was "so firmly impressed as a part of the everyday language of the American public" that it had become part of the public domain. (As a booby prize, the company did keep exclusive usage of the capitalized Thermos.)

In the early '90s, the game and its distinctive caps started becoming fashionable on the mainland. Then, suddenly Pogs were chosen by the fickle hand of cosmic fate to be a kids' toy fad, turning these crappy cardboard circles into a multi-million-dollar industry almost overnight. World Pog Federation, the wrestling-sounding company which had bought the trademarked name off Haleakala, fought hard to remain the only ones allowed to use the Pog name for years (a somewhat weird move when half of your demographic hasn't learned how to read yet).

But the game's success went to their heads. Other companies realized that Pogs could serve as tiny billboards clutched in the hands of the most impressionable of all demographics. WPF gladly took all comers, letting its product be emblazoned with every kid's favorite things: McDonald's arches, Marvel characters, the Pope, and many, many other brands. And that was WPF's mistake -- by letting the big boys put their name on the product, the Pog brand itself became pretty much worthless.

Then everyone started making their own brand of generic cardboard circles. Unlike knockoff Barbies, with their cheap flammable hair and weirdly uneven boobs, Pog discs could be made by anyone with a printer and a pair of scissors. While the WPF managed to hang on to the noble Pog name, it couldn't stop the massive outpouring of off-brand Pogs into the market. Fortunately for them, Pogs stayed relevant nowhere near long enough for any of that to matter. Fortunately for us, it was long enough for it to become really embarrassing:

While most chefs don't mind food plagiarism (stolen hummus is the sincerest form of flattery), those who do have to get creative in their pursuit of justice. In the delicious-sounding Two Pesos, Inc. v. Taco Cabana, Inc. case, Taco Cabana successfully bankrupted its rivals not for stealing its menu, but for foolishly copying its restaurants' style as well. Meanwhile, food blogger / self-described "sugar hero" Elizabeth LaBau sued the Food Network for copying her snow globe cupcake...'s promotional how-to video. So you can get some legal rights for your food; you just have to point a camera at it while you're making it. We never realized "food porn" worked on so many levels.

Cedric Voets invented the listicle. It turned out it already existed, but he arrived at it independently. You can follow more of his insane ramblings on Twitter.

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