Calling all open source developers

[David Bovill]

2009/10/21 François Chaplais <francois.chaplais at mines-paristech.fr>

> Thanks for the feedback. I work in (applied) mathematics, and in this
> fields patents are a no-no. You cannot patent a mathematical idea. The best
> you can do is disseminate it and hope it will have a great number of
> children (I will not digress on the muddy market of scientific publishing).
>
> For instance, JPEG is compression over a discrete cosine transform.  The
> DCT is not copyrighted, it is a mathematical transform. However, it seems to
> me that incorporating into some code that runs on a computer system may make
> it (the code) fit for some form of copyright; moreover, if it is embedded
> into some hardware, the hardware may be patended. Is this right?
>

Roughly - yes. Most IP protection relies on simple legal hacks, and the
entire framework is pretty much a mess in the digital era. My favourite from
of IP protection is the use of "Trade Secrets" - wickedly and quite stupidly
effective.

2009/10/21 Lynn Fredricks <lfredricks at proactive-intl.com>

>From what I can see by all the patents coming out of Apple, you can patent
> just about anything if you wrap it right in legalese ;-)
>

:)  A nice quote from the current head of Creative Commons based on
comparing todays legal climate with the 1920's "anything that makes Jazz
illegal has got to be wrong" - or to take an older example imagine a world
in which culinary recipes were subject to IP laws - good or bad for the
restaurant trade?

Luckily we do have options to help shape a more sane form of sharing,
competing and cooperating. Abandoning law altogether is not an option - it
will just be shaped and used by others. Personally I admire people who use
it sensibly for social purposes. All law is code.