Richard,

You have significantly misinterpreted the concept incorporated in "State
Indus., Inc. v. Mor-Flo Indus., Inc".

The issue in this case, and the others that reference it, is the
question of "willful" infringement. The infringement by itself is not
the issue.

Willful infringement allows for punitive damages and other monetary
claims. Non-willful infringement would generally carry only "cease and
desist" type of remedies.

"Willful" means that one knows about the existing patent, or should have
known about it.

The whole issue of "design-around" relates to the case where the
infringer knew about the patent, attempted to design around it, and
failed to sufficiently differentiate the new item, thereby infringing on
the patent. The infringement stands, but since an effort was made to
design around the original patent the infringement is deemed to be not
"willful". The second party is not granted permission by the courts to
continue to infringe on a valid patent.


I believe Roy is completely correct in his statement of the wording of
the patent law, and court interpretations to do not appear to change the
basic concept.

In a practical sense it is unlikely that anyone would want to sue an
individual one-time infringer making an item for his own use. It is
still a violation of the patent law to infringe, however.

73,
Gene
W4SZ



Richard Clark wrote:
On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 18:44:25 -0800, Roy Lewallen
wrote:

I submit that there's a poorer source of legal information than
administrative offices -- interpretations of the law by people who
aren't lawyers.

...

So by your interpretion of the law, it's ok for anyone to make a copy of
a patented item for personal use (which was the original statment)?


Whose making interpretations now? :-)
The findings already answered the matter with sufficient emphasis as
to intent. If you cannot distinguish intent, you should seek legal
counsel.

Your response reminds me of the satire in "Hitchhiker's Guide to the
Galaxy" where the planet Galafria suffered from serious continental
erosion from too many tourists. They were warned that visitors had to
weigh as much when they left as when they arrived, and were thus
warned under penalty of surgical balance to take care to obtain a
receipt each time they visited the 'loo.

73's
Richard Clark, KB7QHC