Legal Question in Intellectual Property in Oregon

If you publish an article about it, without first obtaining a patent, you are, in effect, giving it away. The way to protect your originality is by getting a patent, period.

Correction: you have 12 months to file a patent application after first publishing it. (35 USC 102). After 12 months, you are statutorily barred from filing your own patent application (in effect, you are your own prior art).

You can say you invented anything you want. But, a patent gives you the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, importing your invention.

Thoughts and ideas are not patentable -- methods and objects of utility are patentable. You must have done enough experimentation to allow the invention to be reduced to practice, and you have to tell the Patent Office (USPTO) the best mode of utilizing your invention (among other things, of course).

I'm sure you can read-up on this at your local library or even on-line on the USPTO website. I do not suggest that you should try to file a patent application yourself. Patent application drafting is a highly technical art which should not be attempted by a novice. Additionally, the patent prosecution process cannot possibly be handled without a registered Patent Attorney.

Best of luck to you.