When Common Sense Met the Patent Office
Every parent has watched their child discover the joy of swinging sideways on a playground swing, twisting the chains and spinning in circles with pure delight. Most of us think, "How cute, kids being kids." But in 2002, one father in Minnesota looked at his five-year-old daughter's playground antics and thought, "I should own the legal rights to this."
And incredibly, the United States Patent and Trademark Office agreed with him.
Photo: United States Patent and Trademark Office, via thumbs.dreamstime.com
The Patent That Broke the Internet Before the Internet Broke
Steven Olson was having a perfectly ordinary day at the park when his daughter started swinging in what patent law would soon classify as "a generally perpendicular direction to the normal direction of swinging." Most dads would have pushed her higher or reminded her to be careful. Olson, however, was struck by what he later described as a moment of pure entrepreneurial inspiration.
Photo: Steven Olson, via www.theyakmag.com
Within weeks, he had filed Patent Application #6,368,227 for "Method of Swinging on a Swing," complete with detailed diagrams showing the revolutionary concept of moving a swing from side to side instead of back and forth. The application was so thorough it included mathematical formulas for the angle of deviation and precise measurements of chain twist.
The patent office, apparently having a slow month, approved the application without question.
The Anatomy of an Absurd Patent
Olson's patent filing reads like a parody of legal documents, but every word was deadly serious. The abstract describes "a method of swing oscillation" that "comprises the steps of positioning a user on the seat, gripping the chains or ropes, and pulling alternately on one chain and then the other."
The document goes on to explain that this revolutionary technique allows the swing to move "in a path that is not in the normal direction of swinging." It even includes helpful illustrations showing stick figures demonstrating this groundbreaking playground technique, complete with arrows indicating the direction of movement.
What makes the patent particularly surreal is its tone of scientific discovery. Olson wrote about sideways swinging as if he'd unlocked a fundamental law of physics rather than watching a kindergartner play. The filing describes the "heretofore unknown" benefits of lateral swing motion and positions the technique as a significant advancement in recreational technology.
How the System Failed So Spectacularly
The approval of Olson's patent reveals everything wrong with America's intellectual property system in one perfect, absurd package. Patent examiners are supposed to reject applications for ideas that are "obvious" or already in common use, but somehow, nobody at the USPTO thought to check if children had been swinging sideways since, well, swings were invented.
The patent office processes hundreds of thousands of applications each year, and examiners have limited time to research each one. But this wasn't some obscure technical innovation — it was literally playground equipment that existed in every park in America. The failure to catch such an obvious case of prior art suggested that the system was either overwhelmed, understaffed, or fundamentally broken.
What's even more remarkable is that Olson's patent sailed through the review process without a single objection. No examiner questioned whether swinging sideways was truly novel. No one pointed out that playground equipment manufacturers had been designing swings to accommodate lateral movement for decades. The application was treated as seriously as patents for life-saving medical devices or revolutionary technologies.
The Brief Reign of the Swing King
For three years, Olson held exclusive legal rights to a movement that millions of children performed daily across America. Technically, every playground in the country was violating his intellectual property. Every parent who taught their child to twist the swing chains was enabling patent infringement. Every school that allowed sideways swinging was risking a lawsuit.
Of course, Olson never actually tried to enforce his patent. He later admitted that the whole thing started as a joke to prove a point about the patent system's flaws. But the fact remained: for 1,095 days, the official records of the United States government stated that one man in Minnesota owned the concept of playground physics.
The patent even attracted international attention when foreign media outlets discovered that America had somehow granted exclusive rights to a basic childhood activity. European newspapers ran headlines mocking the U.S. patent system, while playground equipment manufacturers quietly wondered if they needed to start paying royalties.
The Legacy of Legal Lunacy
Olson's patent was finally invalidated in 2005, not because the patent office realized their mistake, but because public pressure and media attention forced a review. The case became a rallying cry for patent reform advocates who pointed to it as proof that the system was granting rights to ideas that should never have been patentable in the first place.
The sideways swing patent joined a growing collection of absurd intellectual property claims that exposed the USPTO's struggles with obvious applications. Other notable examples from the same era included patents for exercising a cat with a laser pointer, a method of toasting bread, and a technique for cutting hair with scissors.
But Olson's patent was special because it was so universally relatable. Everyone had either swung sideways as a child or watched their own kids discover the technique. It was impossible to argue that this was some obscure innovation that deserved protection — it was literally child's play.
The Playground Revolution That Never Was
In the end, Olson's patent serves as a perfect example of how broken systems can produce perfectly logical absurdities. Every step of the process followed established procedures. The application was properly filed, correctly formatted, and technically compliant with patent requirements. The problem wasn't that the system malfunctioned — it was that the system worked exactly as designed, just with completely ridiculous inputs.
Today, patent reform advocates still cite the sideways swing case as evidence that the USPTO needs better safeguards against obvious applications. The office has implemented some changes, including more thorough prior art searches and additional training for examiners, but critics argue that the fundamental problems remain.
Meanwhile, children across America continue to swing sideways on playground equipment, blissfully unaware that their innocent fun was once the subject of federal intellectual property protection. They twist chains, spin in circles, and discover the joy of lateral momentum, just as kids have done for generations — and hopefully always will, regardless of what any patent office might say about it.
The next time you watch a child figure out how to make a swing move sideways, remember: you're witnessing both the timeless creativity of childhood and a brief moment when that creativity was somehow considered a revolutionary invention worth legal protection. In the end, maybe that's the most unbelievable part of all.
