It's funny to read some of the patents on the patent websites. Just about anything that will ever be invented has been patented in advance to some degree. I remember about 10 years ago we were looking to patent something and there were hundreds of similar patents applied for that were so vague that I have no clue how they could even be enforced. People actuall try to patent things that the technology to make them doesn't even exhist yet. It seems like a patent pending is the best way to go, because it gives you some lead time to get your stuff out there before someone can copy it, by changing or tweaking one little thing