Heat not burn on Amazon?!?

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Rossum

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Apple literally managed to get a patent for "rectangle with rounded corners". It may or may not hold up in court but they did get the patent. So IMHO it's not out of the question for someone to be able to get a patent for an "ENDS device of a specific diameter".
Possibly a "design patent"? Those are quite different than a utility patent for an "invention".

Utility vs. Design - Neustel Law Offices
 

AvaOrchid

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Amazon's 3rd party market system has long been this way. Products of all sorts slip through the cracks, but I think of their model in much the same way I think of Visa or Mastercard, very limited security, and fraud happens. Weeding out all fraud or policy misuse is not the goal. The CC companies know that there will be thefts and losses. Amazon knows there will be some 3rd party companies whose products suck or slip through the policy cracks. Refund those customers who are negatively affect, and maybe take legal action against the fraudsters, if it is worth it, but often it's not. If a system works say 97% of the time as intended, and the system is profitable, then the 3% of frauds (or in this case policy abuse) are more then tolerable.

As for this clone, Philip Morris is more likely to take notice then Amazon ;)
I bet you're right about that last part LOL
 

ScottP

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Possibly a "design patent"? Those are quite different than a utility patent for an "invention".

Utility vs. Design - Neustel Law Offices

It is absolutely a design patent but "rectangle with rounded corners" is more generic than "ENDS device of a specific diameter". The first is a rough generic description of a shape, the second specifies specific dimensions.
 
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AvaOrchid

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For a dozen years or so before I started using e-cigs (Feb. 2011), I made my own cigarettes via the 'stuff your own' method. I notice in the Amazon add that 'customers also purchased' picture of the hnb product + box of king size (hollow) tubes. In my case it was a matter of cost. As well, it set me up for DIY. It was having to go through the preparation to get my satisfaction that helped prepare me some for e-cigs.

That leads me to the question of whether or not one can 'stuff their own' Heet-type sticks. I believe that the tobacco used in such refills is combined with a PG and/or VG type substance. I'm not suggesting that is all there is to the Heat sticks, but it would seem that perhaps something along those line might keep the financial aspect of hnb useage within reason.

An important footnote: Here in Kentucky, where major groundwork was laid for driving smoking out of the public, taxes were kept minimal on loose 'pipe tobacco.' Discount tobacco stores also kept cigarette 'tubes' in stock, and at a price far below what Amazon is offering next to their IQOS-type device. Some of that pipe tobacco was about halfway between cigarette tobacco and pipe tobacco.

Insight appreciated.
Whether they mean for people to be able to stuff their own heat sticks or not a virtually guarantee someone's going to figure out how to do it. I know this is a completely darker subject but for example let's use those supposedly injection proof pills that they have for opioids with all the wax and such it took addict's maybe a couple hours before they had overturned years of supposed advancement to the point where I wonder if the company's only did that to shut everyone up and look like they were doing that ever popular "something" that you always hear about in these sort of situations usually preceded by "we have to do"
 
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So back oh, about the early 90's BiC came out with this so-called child proof lighter that only frustrated us adults. Couldn't get the dang thing to work unless everything was ideal such as perfect amount of oil in your skin to provide enough grip, perfect amount a pressure applied etc etc and forget about it while wearing gloves. Ugh!

Well every afternoon like clock work these two young hoodlums floated past my house in a stuper of some sort all perma-grin faced. I supposed they were going home to eat supper.

Now after a few weeks of aggrevation with these new BiC lighters it popped in my head "I'll bet those hoods know a work around" so I waited by my fence one afternoon all acting busy like. Sure enough at about 4:30 here they come.

I said "hey dude, you know a work around for this stupid thing?" and showed them my lighter. One says to the other "let me see your knife" to which the other pulls out a switch blade and pops it open. Hoodlum 1 takes the knife and plucks off the child proof ring over the flint striker wheel. "Boing" it went flying to who knows where. "Here ya go old dude" he says and hands it back to me. (I was about 30 at the time lol).

I say that to acknowledge that if we want to know a work around to the IQQ thing, just ask a teenager. I'm glad to know that there is a potential for smoking cessation for folks vaping didn't work for. And if folks start showing up in ER's with chemical weapon type illness from said IQQS devices we'll know it wasn't just vaping devices folks bought from the black market.

I don't want to see anybody harmed and truth be known if heat not burn devices help folks stop smoking I welcome them.
 

Mordacai

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What about SMOK, burn not heat technology?

But seriously, it's a Tobacco based product. And there's way too much information around on just how bad it really is from decades of research and leaked internal memos.

As some Tobacco industry employee wrote in an internal memo, doubt is our product.
“Doubt is our product” – fascinating memo on the tobacco industry’s PR strategy

And a fascinating article from the Journal of epidemiology and community health/ british medical journal which outlines what extents the Tobacco industry will go to to further their own agenda.
Tobacco industry efforts at discrediting scientific knowledge of environmental tobacco smoke: a review of internal industry documents
 

stols001

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I may get one for the husband too, just can't decide which is safer, the knockoff or the BT one? I'm sort of... IDK. LOL.

Patents are freaking weird. You can get a patent for "gene therapy" ALL of it. My dad was the VP of the company that did the first successful experiment on the bubble kids, so they secured the patent. They were promptly bought out by MERK oh however you spell it, because that meant ANY gene therapy for the next 30 years or whatever, had to pay the patent holder.

Now THAT strikes me (like vaccines) as something that should not be PATENTABLE but it was. Nuts.

Yeah, those were exciting genetic times. I have not kept up with all l the weird and wacky gene "problems" that kids that used to just be called "mentally ......ed" are now being diagnosed with. Some doc mentioned "Fragile X" syndrome and I was like, "I actually don't know what that is, please explain" and I he looked at me like I had 2 heads. I guess it's the most common one.

I'm was like, "Oh cool, is there a genetic treatment?" and he was like, "Nope." And I was like, "Okay, cool, I shall proceed like I do with EVERY other mental ......ation case without a cure."

Sigh.
Anna
 

AvaOrchid

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I'm giving this heat don't burn a pass - anyone else plan to try it?
While I fully support a variety of nicotine delivery devices for people to use as they wish I personally don't feel like it's going to take off amongst people who Vape. It is very cigarette like however when I tried it I don't know if there was something wrong with the way I used it or if my friends device was faulty or maybe they had substandard sticks but it tasted to me like when you used to smoke and you put a cigarette out and then relit it later it wasn't as strong as that flavor but to me it was reminiscent of it and I've heard a couple other people say the same. That being said I am extremely picky and I notice the slightest off flavor so other people might not even notice that or their palette might determine that it's fine. But yeah that's a hard pass for me. Also I think my friend worked out the cost to be like $30 every 2 days for his habit when he had previously been a pack and a half smoker but this was a little bit ago and I'm not certain what the price point is now
 

amoret

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Amazon's 3rd party market system has long been this way. Products of all sorts slip through the cracks, but I think of their model in much the same way I think of Visa or Mastercard, very limited security, and fraud happens.

Amazon allows 3rd parties to to use Amazon as a pseudo storefront. It may be that Amazon is just not yet aware these products have been added. Especially since last I checked Amazon didn't have Age Verification.

I worked for Amazon, in a different department the last year before I became disabled. (Best employer I ever had as temp who was hired after the holidays.) The problem is because it's just too big, too many sellers, too many products, to keep complete track of. They do stick to their own rules (like no tobacco products) as well as they are able, but sellers can and do lie.

Part of my job was finding fake reviews, and ones we could prove resulted in the seller being dropped. But it takes some doing to find them, and it can be hard to prove if the seller is even borderline intelligent. The hard to find would be even worse with products just because of the sheer number of them.
 

DarrenMG

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@amoret - Understood. I never thought of it as any malicious matter, just as you wrote, sheer volume vs employee count, etc. The store front has no doubt been to a boon to many small businesses who'd otherwise have never been able to handle the stocking, fulfillment, returns, 'where do I buy it?', how do others even learn that this product exists?, etc. on their own. I don't think it's any surprise that some products slip through the cracks of an open system like that.

Related...

Even in the open market vaping world we've enjoyed so far, there have been plenty of shoddy products produced and sold. Still, I bet most of us prefer the free-market benefits, let it sort itself out on it's own and through customer reviews, then the draconian system the FDA wants where every product is tightly regulated to the point of driving legit small businesses out of business, just because there is a small percentage of bad actors that abuse a loosely regulated market.
 
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