OverUnity.com is Open Source

[Pirate88179]

Pirate88179,
               I truly agree with your response. With the Joule Thief thread being almost 1,000 pages I have read very little but I can see the help and contribution each person is giving. And yes, I have read many other threads with the same mentality of the sharing of ideas and helping one another to accomplish good.
               So think about this, what if a person says " I just love Open Source" and then does not want to give required info for replication. Also openly states that someone else is copying their research device AND stating that there are NO PATENTS AND if certain people try to ever market anything relating to their device they will sue them for the intellectual rights. Does this sound like a person who really UNDERSTANDS what OPEN SOURCE means?

        J

J:

Yes, I have seen the type of behavior you describe on this forum (very rare) and other forums as well.  One fellow here accepted the help of many of the forum members and then, when his idea worked, he deleted all of his posts and was off to the patent office.  Too bad for him that, as Conrad has pointed out, he has already disclosed "his" idea to the general public by publishing here so....his patent, if granted, would be easily rendered null and void if challenged by anyone that knew of his prior public disclosure.  Thankfully, this is far from the norm here on OU dot com.

Conrad:

I really think that an inventor is protected by publicly disclosing on a forum like this because if someone ran off and patented something they saw here, it should be an easy case to prove that it was not his idea and was publicly disclosed prior to his filing and his patent would be worth nothing.  This is, of course, my opinion but I believe I am correct.

Bill

[sm0ky2]

"open source" to me, means fully and freely sharing the entire subject matter at hand.

Teaching everyone who reads it, what it is, how it works, and how to build their own from the ground up.
There is no room for possession, assets, property rights, ect when it comes to open source.
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That being said, i think there should be some degree of social and moral standards when it comes to open sourcing energy projects.
You wouldn't want to teach everyone how to build a specific-gravity centrifuge and harvest their own uranium.

or teach people how to create a massive exothermic chemical reaction in their back yard.......

While other things are perfectly acceptable, such as plans for small-scale steam-engine that runs on scrap-wood and twigs.

or user #x's magneto-twirlie-gig, that outputs 1.4 watts of electricity.

So,. deciding what and how to open source something, has not only Materialistic factors involved, but also social, moral, and legal factors as well.
The end result is ultimately, a random mixture of the varying degrees of "open source" interpretation and implementation, for every possible "reason" a person can come across on their journey.

This guy wants to make a buck, that guy sole the other guys idea, these two people came up with it on their own, but one got a patent, so the other cant open source it. this girl wants to open source but is scared of the M.I.B.'s,  this guy told that guy not to mix powdered chlorine and brake fluid and the kid down the block accidently blows up the pool house. Or maybe this guy just wants to hold onto that one piece of information that makes his entire puzzle complete,  you know, for security reasons, or just to be a *#@!!. 

Open source can be a very good thing, when it is used properly.
the power of having hundreds of brilliant minds at your disposal day and night, is truly amazing. and who knows, maybe you can help someone out on their open source idea too.

[Pirate88179]

Smokey:

I believe (with respect) that your one example is flawed in that, if 2 people came up with the SAME idea independently, and one guy published it open source and the other guy obtained a patent on it, the patent would be worthless because it had already been disclosed to the public.  Therefore the open source guy would be free to do whatever he wanted to with it.  Again, this only works IF it is the exact same device or idea.

I do agree about the moral issues but I don't know what could be done about that?

Bill

[sm0ky2]

@ bill

theres nothing that can be done, except to trust that most people that are smart enough to be dangerous, are of sufficient moral ground to be cautious with their knowledge.

a good chunk of what floats around in my head would have to come with a "dont try this at home kids", and an even larger chunk that i wouldnt share (and some that i would probably get in serious trouble if i did).

I guess thats just my personal thing. I have no say or control over Peter or EnergyBlogger483, if they want to open source an HV-Plasma cannon that disentegrates physical matter.
am i to say wether that is "right" or "wrong" ? certainly not.
but if it was my plasma-gun, it wouldn't be in the hands of little 8yr old tommy jones whos daddy just bought him an electronics kit.

[Pirate88179]

Smokey:

I totally agree.

Bill