Copyright/patent and Intellectual Property laws?

[bcnu]

The "idea" of having followers has been around since there were first leaders or scholars. The only thing a patent does is allow someone to prevent others from making the same INVENTION. In order to know what the invention is, you would need to read the patent (if there is one) and interpret the "claims" of the owners to their "property" rights in the invention. You would then either get a license from them to do "the same thing" or figure out a new way to "do the same thing", but in a way that is not described in their claims or an obvious equivalent. This is called 'engineering around the claims' and is perfectly legal.