Patents for landscaping and gas sations on the Moon

Here are couple of odd patent involving the moon. First, there is a startup raising money to fly robots to the moon, in order to rearrange surface sand on the moon to create large advertisements seen from space. The company is at: www.moonpublicity.com, and their ads tout their patent application.

Second, an utterly obvious claim being sought by Space Adventures in their U.S. patent application 20070128582, "Method, apparatus and system for private lunar exploration", with claim 1 , the obvious (i.e., ridiculous) content added afterward, in square brackets:

1. A method of registering for private space travel to the moon [or
travel on a yacht], comprising: providing a first spacecraft [yacht]
adapted to carry at least one private individual; receiving payment
from the private individual for registration for a flight [cruise]
on the first spacecraft [yacht]; providing launching of the first
spacecraft from the earth [yacht from the harbor] carrying the
private individual; and providing travel into lunar orbit [offshore
routes] for the private individual in the first spacecraft [yacht].

The inventors of the following issued patent must be extremely optimistic
with regards to how soon man will be spending a lot of time in outer space:

Propellant depot in space
U.S. Patent 7,559,508: Depots imply a lot of traffic, and I just don't see a lot of vehicular traffic in outer space in the next twenty years when their patent expires.

all about the big O

Via: Medical Insurance

A patent: a time wasted or not

A comment from an inventor questioning whether or not to waste his time and money filing a patent (and disclosing his innovation), if he is going to get screwed by the PTO:

Personally I have been pausing in the wings before I submit several
patent applications, so that I am reasonably assured that it is
worth the time and effort to do so. It may very well be that I am
better off not filing anything at all, if the applications can be
construed as just revealing what I have invented, with very few
options if it costs too much to respond to the PTO, and thus very
little value conferred by doing so.

A great issue for the AIPLA, IPO, or ABA, if any of these groups actually
cared about everyone's interest in a healthy patent system.

If the Patent Reform efforts succeed, we are all just dog meat,
after all, and all of my efforts and my money spent trying to
acquire a US patent will be for naught. Somewhat frustrating, when
I sincerely believe that I have much to contribute in the alternative
energy field.