You missed a more important and fundamental misconception: namely, the OP is trying to apply copyright-related practices (releasing into the public domain, Creative Commons’s licenses) to ideas. In other words, he is confusing patents and copyrights.
Furthermore, although it is noble for the OP to try to keep a line of innovation free from patents, the OP’s written promise not to apply for a patent on something probably has no legal weight because it was not made in exchange for any kind of consideration. (The requirement that a promise maker obtain some sort of considerations for the promise to be enforceable in a court of law is a basic principle of contract law.). Note that “I hereby place this post in the public domain,” and “I hereby give everyone a license to this post under Creative Commons bla bla,” are exceptions to the general rule that promises made “without consideration” are not legally enforceable, but, again, releasing into the public domain and Creative Commons’s licenses have nothing to do with ideas or patents.
The most important thing about patents is that the vast majority of actors who are sued for infringing a patent are selling at least tens of millions of dollars a year in infringing products or services. In other words, the vast expense of patent litigation means that most people using technology to improve the world can safely ignore patents (plans to improve the world that entail someone’s selling tens of millions of dollars a year worth of goods and services probably being the biggest exception).
The second most important thing to know about patents, by the way, is that sometimes venture capitalists will refuse to invest in a company either because the company lacks patents or has competitors who have patents, but this is really just a corollary of the first most important thing about patents, since almost all venture-capital investment is made with the hope that the investee will someday sell at least hundreds of millions of dollars a year in goods and services.
TL;DR: while I commend the OP’s generous spirit, his paragraph about patents is unnecessary.
Thank you. But wait. A copyright and patent are not the same thing. If you release the rights to a patent, might you still retain the copyright, because it is different?
If you release the rights to a patent, might you still retain the copyright, because it is different?
Well, yeah, but if you decide to hoard the copyright on your post (i.e., the post above), that decision would not prevent anyone from creating or selling a product or service that incorporates inventions described in the post. The only thing your copyright on your post can make illegal is the making of copies of the exact same sequence or almost-exact same sequence of words in your post.
The only thing your copyright on your post can make illegal is the making of copies of the exact same sequence or almost-exact same sequence of words in your post.
No. For instance, a movie based on the post might not involve any common sequences of words. Especially if it’s silent.
ADDED. Well, if I wanted to get technical, I would point out that the post is near the lower limit in size of works that can be copyrighted. That is, even in the best of circumstances, it would be difficult to prevail in a copyright infringement suit on the basis of such a small number of words, and the particular part of copyright law that deals with movies based on novels is probably far from the best of circumstances. So, I could make the technical argument that my statement was probably correct because I was referring to one particular rather-short Less-Wrong post, not copyrightable works in general including things like novels. But enough!
You missed a more important and fundamental misconception: namely, the OP is trying to apply copyright-related practices (releasing into the public domain, Creative Commons’s licenses) to ideas. In other words, he is confusing patents and copyrights.
Furthermore, although it is noble for the OP to try to keep a line of innovation free from patents, the OP’s written promise not to apply for a patent on something probably has no legal weight because it was not made in exchange for any kind of consideration. (The requirement that a promise maker obtain some sort of considerations for the promise to be enforceable in a court of law is a basic principle of contract law.). Note that “I hereby place this post in the public domain,” and “I hereby give everyone a license to this post under Creative Commons bla bla,” are exceptions to the general rule that promises made “without consideration” are not legally enforceable, but, again, releasing into the public domain and Creative Commons’s licenses have nothing to do with ideas or patents.
The most important thing about patents is that the vast majority of actors who are sued for infringing a patent are selling at least tens of millions of dollars a year in infringing products or services. In other words, the vast expense of patent litigation means that most people using technology to improve the world can safely ignore patents (plans to improve the world that entail someone’s selling tens of millions of dollars a year worth of goods and services probably being the biggest exception).
The second most important thing to know about patents, by the way, is that sometimes venture capitalists will refuse to invest in a company either because the company lacks patents or has competitors who have patents, but this is really just a corollary of the first most important thing about patents, since almost all venture-capital investment is made with the hope that the investee will someday sell at least hundreds of millions of dollars a year in goods and services.
TL;DR: while I commend the OP’s generous spirit, his paragraph about patents is unnecessary.
(OP upvoted, BTW.)
Thank you. But wait. A copyright and patent are not the same thing. If you release the rights to a patent, might you still retain the copyright, because it is different?
Well, yeah, but if you decide to hoard the copyright on your post (i.e., the post above), that decision would not prevent anyone from creating or selling a product or service that incorporates inventions described in the post. The only thing your copyright on your post can make illegal is the making of copies of the exact same sequence or almost-exact same sequence of words in your post.
No. For instance, a movie based on the post might not involve any common sequences of words. Especially if it’s silent.
I accept the correction.
ADDED. Well, if I wanted to get technical, I would point out that the post is near the lower limit in size of works that can be copyrighted. That is, even in the best of circumstances, it would be difficult to prevail in a copyright infringement suit on the basis of such a small number of words, and the particular part of copyright law that deals with movies based on novels is probably far from the best of circumstances. So, I could make the technical argument that my statement was probably correct because I was referring to one particular rather-short Less-Wrong post, not copyrightable works in general including things like novels. But enough!