The concept/idea is not what is patented. The patent is (or should be) for the specific execution of the idea. Competitors are free to implement their feature using methods other that what is covered by the patent, even if the end result gives the exact same functionality.
IP lawyer here (EDIT: not yours, of course): That's a considerable (and potentially-dangerous) oversimplification. What matters is whether what you do comes within the claims of the patent.
(For a more-detailed explanation, written in pseudocode-like terms, see a 2010 post I did: https://www.oncontracts.com/how-patent-claims-work-a-variety....)
Tangentially, it gets difficult in software because a lot of patents are .... maybe overbroad in their wording of claims. Lot of ambiguous looking landmines.
This is somewhat similar to business method patents (which were curtailed a little by the SC a decade ago, but were already known to be kinda sketchy for decade+ before that). Can't patent a pure algorithm, for example.
Doesn't that mean that in general it is also a really bad idea to ask an engineer questions about a particular piece of tech that they patented at a previous employer, even though the specific information is a matter of public record by virtue of being explained in the patent?
"Willful blindness" can be a danger (according to the Supreme Court, albeit in a different context).
Possibly a bigger danger: Your product gets kicked out of the market by an injunction (a court order to stop making, using, selling, etc.)
I did similar for medical self-symptom before ACA prevented "pre-existing condition" scam.
Have you ever seen patents? They rarely cover the implementation details, or at most they're intentionally super vague about that, most of the time it's just the general idea on how the widget would work and what it does, but not how to implement it technically.
https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/6/16614038/apple-samsung-sl...
It expired in 2017 but for the period it was in force, Amazon collected millions in licensing fees.
if you can’t figure out how its implemented you’re looking at an invalid patent or an application
> they're intentionally super vague about that
yes that’s how claims work
> most of the time it's just the general idea on how the widget would work and what it does, but not how to implement it technically
you’re looking at an invalid patent or an application
The implementation or execution of the idea usually takes the form of some Verilog or some C++. That is covered by copyright.
The patent is for the idea. Which is part of why I'm so opposed to patents, not just in software. In other fields, like medicine, patents are perhaps for discoveries, which are IMHO similarly valuable as the execution. But ideas aren't that valuable, or shouldn't be.
I feel like the granularity of patents is defined more so by where the frontier of knowledge is for a given domain than the patent office (i.e. what is hard but also valuable). But, I also haven’t spent a lot of time with patents