Hi Jeremie,

Having worked for a large corporate for most of my career I have been conditioned to believe that my ideas do not belong to me.  I do not agree with this and it caused me considerable frustration throughout my career. I rarely received attribution or recognition for my ideas as they were most often taken by multiple lines above me.  What was worse is I was not allowed to blog or post about my ideas prior to implimentation as I was bound by various NDA's and employee contracts.

I no longer work for a corporate and now I look at my CV and there is very little I can prove are my original ideas, even though they are commercially available products or systems in production today.  I was lucky in that I have over 100 patents with my name on them but I don't actually get any financial reimbursement for their usage. The company I worked for owns all my IP.

If you are in a position to file a patent before you share with others is a good first step.  You don't actually have to build the product to file a patent, it just has to be well documented and technically feasible. This of course costs money and your employer may assume ownership of your IP anyway.  I do think if you can demonstrate you are an expert in your field and post your ideas as they arise in a time stamped format, you are in a better position to demonstrate your initiation and development of an idea.

Should you get attribution, Absolutely, Will someone take your ideas if they can and not attribute it to you, Guaranteed.

Thank you for the response @Nink

I don't know if I would ever file a patent but I do like the idea of publishing the idea with a time stamp.

For most of my content I have done just that, I have published YouTube, Instagram, TikTok videos, Instructables, and posts here in the community with time-stamped dates.

From what you mentioned, it seems my desire for attribution is founded but actually getting attribution is another story. I would rather not have to chase someone to get to force people to attribute, some people just don't even have that in their nature.

Do you think I should just assert myself even more and publish my content more aggressively and more often?

> Do you think I should just assert myself even more and publish my content more aggressively and more often? It depends on a number of factors. If you are working on ideas for your employer and your employment contract stipulates that your intellectual property belongs to them or if it can be assumed that it belongs to them then I believe you would need to obtain clearance. Personally if I was your employer I would say no. I would suggest you wait until after product launch and unfortunately I would probably not give you credit.

If it is personal work and you are allowed under any contractual agreement to work on something outside of your employment then it would also depend. Do you want to keep the idea secret, will you manufacture the product or a variant of the product in the future.

I am going to assume what you are really are looking for is increased level of visibility and public awareness of your skill, expertise and contributions to your field.  If this is the case then publish away. We have all watched videos of people who have little to no expertise in a subject who publish hundreds of videos and have millions of followers and you ask yourself why is anyone watching this. It is always refreshing to view content from someone with real skill actually publishing what they are working on versus just taking someone else's ideas and producing tons of content.

Thanks again @Nink

It's a bit of a grey area as I have gained a vast amount of knowledge and experience over the last 2 decades working for my employers, most covered under NDA, some not. It is sometimes hard to differentiate. If I do plan on producing some content closely related to my contract, I do ask for permission first.

You assume correctly I am quite frustrated when seeing people give advice related to my field who are not fully informed, lack experience, or mischaracterize information.

hi jeremie

i think the hole world has become a grab culture . i agree you should always atleast ask , a person to use there designs . i also think platforms like thingevers were most things are free , is part of the problem . if your an annest person you dont do that . i can imagine its easy to , make excample an alan robot head like will design . i allreddy saw them on youtube . there's allot of bad stuff going on in this world . its all about the money and who's first . i hope i understand a little off your question .

Hi Jeremie,

For me your post hits home in a "I feel your pain" moment.  You have a creative problem-solving mind and you've invested in your knowledge and skill set to be able to do what you do and you do it well and you can see you've contributed a lot to others and in larger communities like here, but you aren't feeling the appreciation and acknowledgement returned.  It even feels a bit taken advantage of.

It's like energy out, but where is the energy being returned, right?

I'm like you, I believe in giving credit where credit is due as well.  At work if I did 90% of the work but others did 10% or even 1%, I make sure everyone knows it was a team effort.  Sometimes I see others lead a project and I might have contributed a significant amount to the project, yet I'll hear the project lead say "I" a lot instead of "team", lol.  I've made peace with it and I try to understand it isn't a slant towards me and shouldn't color my outlook negatively.

What would it look like for you to feel positively about your work being appreciated?

Thanks @Nomad and @Justin, I appreciate your input!

@Justin I do really like your question and I will have to consider it closely. It's not something I have seriously asked myself.

Quote:

What would it look like for you to feel positively about your work being appreciated?

Off the top of my head, I can come up with the following: You could use shoutouts and tags in social media posts or have a contributors list at the bottom of a project or video description. You could create a social media post or video that directly thanks the people that inspired/helped you. In a community forum like this, you could show idea credit by elaborating on someone's post by stating for example: "To build off what @Justin was saying..." or "@Justin had a great idea when he mentioned...." There's also wikipedia as well to immortalize credit.

Thinking in reverse I will now ask myself the following question: "How will I recognize others in the public space and make them feel appreciated for the work they've done and the ideas they've contributed?"

When it comes to these kinds of things I shouldn't forget that sometimes it's easier to "be the change" rather than just desiring it.

Awesome points Jeremie!  I really do believe if people see us practice gratitude and do positive things like spread appreciation for contributions or similar works that lead to inspiration in any public spaces it will have a positive impact. 

With my Cylon project I'v tried to share some credit for inspiration I've taken from Robo Rad and Will Huff. I could do much better though at recognizing others.

It's curious to me, because every time I succeed at something with my robot or even art projects, I do think about all the things I learned from others that contributed to this thing I just accomplished, yet I largely keep that appreciation private in my own head and don't acknowledge others as often as I should.  This thread inspires me to do better.  Thank you for that @Jeremie!

@Jeremie I read your GeoCaching article in the latest issue of MAKE magazine, Vol 86.  First of all, CONGRATULATIONS!!!   Way to go!!!

I really enjoyed your article, because I never "got" what GeoCaching was before, with your writing style it really brought me into that experience almost like I was along for the ride with you and I could really picture your enthusiasm and it helped me understand the appeal it has and helped me "get it".

Have you ever considered authoring a book on some of your various maker and robotics experiences or perhaps more article in the future?

Thank you very much @Justin!

I really appreciate the positive feedback, and glad you enjoyed it!

I don't think I'd ever have time to write a book but I do plan on making a bunch of TikToks, Instagram Reels and YouTube shorts on robot-related content. I've been shooting all my videos in portrait (vertical) mode lately so they won't work for regular YouTube content. I have almost finished outfitting my garage to double as a video studio, I'm thinking about going live again but this time both TikTok and YouTube.

I have so much accumulated content that I've filmed over the last 2 years that I really need to edit and release. I usually use the mobile TikTok interface to edit videos but it's still a bit painful when it comes to adding songs that won't get flagged on other platforms for copyright infringement. It's especially hard when it comes to longer-form content because the majority of audio clips are only 1min. YouTube shorts are max 1min so maybe I'll have to limit myself to 1min content and do a series in parts. I could also make videos without songs but I would likely have a hard time wrapping my head around it

At this point in my life, I realize that I'm never going to be a great teacher but I do love to share stories and experiences with people. I'm not great at it but I am growing in that area and desire to be better.

I do like writing articles, maybe servo magazine would be interested?

For what its worth I've spent decades working with people and companies that gave no credit to contributions I made no matter their size or impact. It never got better until, I decided that it was important to me, that people knew about those contributions and I became very vocal. It often rubbed people the wrong way and sometimes I got threatened to shut up or be fired. But in the end I stuck to my guns. Often the people barking the loudest were the ones who had the least amount of skills sets and were trying to make themselves look more competent.

When I have opportunities I thank everyone for their contributions. Its important for everyone to feel their contributions have value, no matter how big or small they maybe. If you find yourself in a position to start a company or work on a project make sure everyone has been accounted for.

Social media is one way to ensure your voice is heard and to display what you are working on/creating and how you are doing it. Also doing colabs with people can get you more exposure, especially if you are working on the same project together. As long as it is not crossing over any non-compete/ NDAs issues.

The long short of it, treat others with the respect and recognition you feel you deserve. Find a pathway to attaining what is important to you and don't let others dissuade you from that path. Be vocal about your contributions, because most people will not do it for you. Most of all remember, you are the captain of your ship.

Thanks Will!

That definitely confirms a few things for me. We are likely going to be the only true advocates for ourselves in this life, and masters of letting the world around us know what we need and truly desire. What my friends used to call, "good people", do exist out there. They may hype you up at times, and genuinely are happy for you but it's rare to have a person or company really promote you as an individual. I think it's a self-interest thing, maybe we are too individualistic and competitive in our culture. People would love to see themselves or their company celebrated. We don't recognize that talent in certain areas is rare and rather than celebrate it some people would rather try and emulate it to see if they can do better, or downplay it.

I'm at a crossroads between cynicism and acceptance. Slowly starting to move forward!

Hi Jeremie,

I was just reading many posts and I came across your post for The Desire For attribution. Are you not remunerated monetarily or if you want to be? - I don’t know your agreements or contracts

attribution: the action of regarding something as being caused by a person or thing the action of ascribing a work or remark to a particular author, artist, or person the action of regarding a quality or feature as characteristic of or possessed by a person or thing

For whatever it is worth, just to let you know I do appreciate your contributions to EzRobot and Synthian. You and DJ did some wonderful demonstrations in the past. Like to see more...:D

I am basically new to robotics, started around 2020 (3 years) learned many things here.

I see social media is one of the problems, it does not reflect the true meaning of people’s reactions or thoughts.

Face Book Youtube etc and the rest, can leave a bad taste in your mouth, so to speak.

maybe self-satisfaction and achievements are enough  nallycat had some similar thoughts in the past:

nallycat Canada #40 Jul 2020

@EzAng Thanks for the nice Comment,

Just between you and me I don't think many members of Synthiam appreciate when you make videos, not many even comment on your videos and they don't realize the time and effort it takes to make videos.

I use my time for building and designing and I like helping members with fresh ideas.

if you check youtube there are a few videos I made of my inmoov robot. Cog is my latest robot and not many members found interest in Cog.

as it is not in my nature to impress people, I build for myself.

That is why it is so quiet at synthiam. no body likes to comment on anything

nallycat Canada #54 Jul 2020

@EzAng As I have said I don't waste my time making videos, as no one watches them anyway

AI has no real feelings, don't look for attribution there

I went through a phase of not making videos because I didn’t see an impact. But once I stopped, I saw the impact haha. There may have only been a handful of views, but those views mattered. They mattered because those viewers needed the content. So I ended up realizing that it’s not about the number of ppl that I help - but the one person who really needed it.

comparing robot videos to other Tik tok content isn’t relatable. Even if a robot video gets a lot of views, its follow up interaction is minimal. Algorithms of tik tok give everyone a hit to keep them addicted - even though there’s no follow through.

good way to tell us take a tik tok artist and look at their YouTube. You’ll get one or two views only.

so what I’m saying is don’t measure your success on how many ppl watch. Consider the few that really matter.

Lastly, on behalf of the forum not having a large comment interaction - that’s normal these days. And it isn’t isolated to Synthiam. There’s an overwhelming list of social apps. Ppl who have relevant things to say don’t converse on social anymore because they use real life interactions instead. The ppl who do use social for comments is about complaining or arguing. So the lack of interaction on Synthiam is good because it means less hostility - unlike other robot forums which is full of ego and opinions.

now lastly I want to say that the view count of content on the forum says a lot. A thread can have thousands or tens of thousands of views, but only a handful of comments. Remember, that means lots of ppl actually read and looked at your content but didn’t feel like engaging in conversation about it. They may have learned from it. They may have found it entertaining. But what ever it was, there’s tens of thousands of ppl doing that to many threads here.

even this thread has 156 views at time of my comment - meaning ppl are interested whether or not they have anything to say. I really don’t have a lot to say on social these days but that doesn’t stop me from watching and reading every video and post on here

Thanks for your reply and kind words @EZAng!

While I do half expect to receive attribution from my employer, this is more about my contributions to the maker community in general. My contributions to the maker world often go unnoticed and there is zero compensation or remuneration for these efforts. In fact, I often lose time and sleep and have to invest my personal funds into projects. If attribution were applied correctly I would likely be okay with losing these things as it would be a fair trade-off. Credit (where credit is due) and legacy are deeply important things to me.

It may be an unrealistic expectation, as it's not natural for our society/employers to do this.

I've learned a few things here and there are a bunch of ideas things that have come out of this conversation that I think are important:

• Advocate for yourself, verbally state your desires and needs to others
• You are your greatest and loudest advocate, raise your voice
• Social media is fickle, and the majority of people are self-interested
• Do things for your own satisfaction, see receiving credit or accolades as a bonus
• Even if things are always a competition, refuse to see it that way, lift everyone up
• Rather than hold onto ideas, demonstrate that you are great at the development of ideas
• Everyone is attracted to and inspired by positivity and excitement, don't flounder in self-pity
• Be the change, raise others up, and build lasting community as a result
• Spread the attitude of gratitude and appreciation

Oh and also add that copying is the best form of flattery. so in regards to some things I see other companies doing to copy your efforts is flattery haha