ZeroG arm - Equipois

I think Lloyd is not quite correct. He would be correct if you are talking about something like software that is licensed, and then the restriction against reverse engineering is due to the contract you entered into with the licensor. However, if you buy something with a circuit board there is absolutely no reason you can not reverse engineer the circuit and publish the results even if it is patented. In fact the patent is already supposed to disclose the best embodiment of the invention known to the inventor at the time of filing.

The only thing you can not do is to advocate that people break the law by telling them they should make copies of the invention. An example of that might be where you sell the schematic and all the components in a kit. The only exception is that someone can make a copy for "purely philosophical inquiry" (i.e. non-applied scientific research).

Note: I am not a patent lawyer, but I have spent waaay too much time talking with them.

There was an exception for personal use in the U.S. But it was eliminated quite a number of years ago.

Dan

Yes. The innovation is that they came up with a better way to do it. The details are in the patent, and not in the sales propaganda.

Joe Gwinn

We would both be shocked to learn just how true that was.

--Winston

I will tell him he scraped by *again*!

(...)

I ain't so sure.

The USPTO, very lightly paraphrased says: Basically a U.S. patent is a patentee's 'license to sue' "*to exclude others from making*, using, offering for sale, or selling the invention throughout the United States or importing the invention into the United States".

Emphasis is still mine.

I don't see an 'inquiry' exception.

'Sounds like they play in the 'gray area' legally speaking. Not too surprising, that. :)

--Winston

Yup. Apparently copying even a portion of the patented intellectual property is infringement but people get away with it for various reasons anyway.

--Winston

The primary reasons are 1) stealth. The infringee doesn't know what's going on behind closed shop doors. and 2) sheer cost of any pursuit of each infringement. Spending $3k to go after a guy who knocks off a single instance of a $30 gewgaw (or even a $400 blurfl) is silly.

If someone's knocking out 1,000 items a week, one can't afford NOT to go after him.

-- Good ideas alter the power balance in relationships, that is why good ideas are always initially resisted. Good ideas come with a heavy burden. Which is why so few people have them. So few people can handle it. -- Hugh Macleod

In my old outfit they would do that kind of thing just because they hadn't broken a law in several minutes.

--Winston

It is based on a long history of case law. Here is a not so brief summary of the issue. I see here the exception is a little broader than I had thought. It is "solely for amusement, to satisfy idle curiosity, or for strictly philosophical inquiry"

It probably not what you were thinking. It is just that I am the inventor on many patents assigned to various former employers and current clients. But the whole process of patenting something is very tedious, times consuming, and not much fun.

There has got to be an interesting story that explains why this exemption didn't feature prominently in the USPTO website. For example, I saw no mention in: ' Perhaps I just glazed over it. :)

(...)

And for individuals, a complete waste of time and money.

--Winston

Oh boy, I wouldn't want to have to fight with a bag of lawyers about what was, or was not, actively inducing others to infringe.

Of course the fact the patent has drawings could be considered that...

Indeed. I was once the sole inventor of a widget that the company wanted to patent. Rather than go through the process myself, I brought in a colleague to do it. He would be a co-inventor, even though he had nothing to do with it's design, and translate it into patent-ese. He was an ambitious jerk who did it gladly, just to get another patent with his name on it.

Bob

You and me both. Like much of patent law, that provision sure seems to favor the party with deep pockets.

--Yah; it was a big company and a little magazine; 'twas ever thus..