On Sat, 17 Mar 2007 23:16:20 -0500, John Fields
wrote:

snip
My point, though, was that if the OP copies the patent for practical
use he'll be infringing the patent unless he gets permission to copy
it from the owner of the patent.

I've been learning from reading these points. But I believe you are
taking a narrow view, here. In Europe, I gather any implementation of
a patent that's just for personal use is completely exempt. So this
may be a US-only thing.

Jon