Fredrik Eriksson wrote:
> Most importantly:
>  "The exclusive right shall not apply to:
>  (1) use which is not commercial"

Wikipedia:

"""
The rights conveyed by a patent vary country-by-country. For example, in 
the 
United States, a patent covers research, except "purely philosophical" 
inquiry. A U.S. patent is infringed by any "making" of the invention, eve
n a 
making that goes toward development of a new invention—which may 
itself 
become subject of a patent.
"""

So here, you don't even get to try it out yourself to see if you can make
 it 
better.  Actually, I thought that patents explicitly did *not* cover use 
for 
research purposes, so either Wikipedia is wrong, the law changed since I 

learned it, or I'm misremembering. It would seem terribly counter-product
ive 
to let patents exclude research, given that the whole patent system is 
intended to promote research.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
    Ada - the programming language trying to avoid
    you literally shooting yourself in the foot.

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