🎙 Inventive Journey | Real Stories From the Startup Survival Club

Can you patent a new use for an existing product? It sounds simple, but the answer sits at the intersection of patent law, product strategy, and a common inventor mistake: assuming that a new idea about an old product...

Copying a successful product can look like smart business. The market already exists, customers understand the category, and a competitor has done much of the work of proving demand. But when a patented product is...

Word-of-mouth can be one of the most powerful growth channels for a small business—but only when customers have something worth talking about and an easy way to make the introduction. In this episode, we break down...

How to Tell If Your Product Infringes a Patent You have a product. It works. Customers want it. Manufacturing is warming up. Then somebody asks the question no founder wants to hear five minutes before launch: “Are we...

The registered trademark symbol looks tiny, but for business owners it carries far more weight than a normal keyboard character. In this episode, we break down how to type the ® symbol on Windows, Mac, iPhone, iPad, and...

In this episode of The Inventive Journey, Devin Miller talks with Abbas Mohammed about cold calls, persistence, remote hiring, AI, and business focus that keeps founders from becoming full-time firefighters with...

In this episode of The Inventive Journey, Devin Miller interviews Sergey Korolev about a founder path that refuses to stay in one lane. Sergey’s story begins with robotics engineering at Bauman Technical University in...

In this Inventive Journey episode, Devin Miller talks with Justin Roopnarine about a career path that moved from electrical engineering to software, from the Air Force to finance, and eventually into fund management. It...

A new hair product can feel like magic in a bottle, but the business side needs more than hope, foam, and a confident launch post. This episode-style breakdown explores how founders can think about patenting a hair...

Can you get an international patent? Not exactly, and that surprise has caused more founder confusion than a cap table spreadsheet named “final-final-real-version.” This episode breaks down why there is no single...

Can an ordinary word become a trademark? Yes—and that answer is more useful, more nuanced, and slightly more dangerous than it sounds. This episode-style breakdown explores how common words can become powerful brand...

Your trademark can last a very long time. Potentially forever. But, like a houseplant, a customer relationship, or the office printer that only works when spoken to respectfully, it needs care. This episode breaks down...

AI-generated images are no longer a futuristic party trick. They are sitting inside marketing departments, startup pitch decks, agency workflows, website headers, product mockups, and social media calendars. The visuals...

Trademark cancellation is the part of brand protection nobody wants to think about, right up until it becomes the entire meeting agenda. In this article-style episode description, we break down why even a registered...

A U.S. trademark is valuable, but it does not automatically protect your brand around the world. That is the big lesson in this article on international trademark protection, and it catches many founders and small...