[Discuss] curious statement on github about oshwa certiification

[Antoine C.]

Hi Tjeerd.
Great questions.
Not easy questions.
Following, 2 ways.

#####
# 1/ Proposal to participate to the possible improvement of the current
state:
#####
There are indeed many people from this pleasant peaceful list who might
give you some great feedbacks, however can you also ask to lawyers from
the licence you target to use for your next (or current) things made
with atoms under terms and conditions that will make those things under
openness spirit and practices.
For example, if you target to follow the FSF advices, and chose to use
the GNU-GPL for a pedagogic document explaining the way a thing made
with atoms could be done, and why, and how (etc, with science
reasoning,  ...), then you might ask your questions to lawyers people
belonging to FSF. Mr Richard Stallman, or FSF lawyer, will be pleased to
explain you many things.
You can do the same for the other licences that are listed both by FSF,
or by OSHWA, and that are said being working well for "Free Libre Open
Source Documentation for Hardware": ask to CC lawyers; ask to APL
lawyer; ask to SOLDERPAD Licence lawyer; ask to TAPR-OHL lawyer; ask to
CERN-OHL lawyer (my preference).
Why am I answering this to you ?
Because, your questions are on the table for many many many people
around the globe. And the current answers do not completely fill a full
satisfaction.
Then, "we" (as people who have been swimming into the FLOS hardware
pool), could try to improve this by asking to lawyers from those
licences, which are said as working to put openness into "things made
with atoms and build by humans or by robots made by humans or by robots
made by robots made by humans" (currently called O"pen Hardware").
Asking to those people, it will generate one more additional ticketing
request: the more there are requests to improve the current state, the
more people will consider there is as a huge demand to answer to, and
the more it will start a move. The move will might be:

* 1. Better communication about those questions in web pages of:
** a) major actors like: OSHWA, Apache Foundation, Mozilla Foundation,
CC, CERN, TAPR,
** b) massive internet information sources (wikipedia, ...)

* 2. Attempt to improve the current tools like:
** a) create an official public publication tools for all nations (or
per nations) for patentable things, which will allow to publish things
publicly in an official way accepted by courts of many places around the
world (My recommendation *is* to place this tools *in a neutral place*
as is the CERN or UNESCO, but not in one specific country).
** b) generate an improvement of current OHL licences (SOLDERPAD, TAPR,
CERN OHLs), which will allow:
*** i) you to choose your preferable FLOS licence for the documentation
*** ii) irrigate the downstream manufacturings with the continuity of
the documentation terms and conditions delivery
*** iii) you to choose additional options (like CC does) which are
answering to current requests of some openness people
**** - continuity of documentation terms and conditions onto hardware
modifications downstream
**** - reciprocity for commercial use (financing of a common pool and
makers in an equilibrium retribution/contribution)
**** - respect of local cultures and practices above the copyright
supremacy (which unfortunately, across copyleft, spreads a sort of
"mono-way-to-view" questions of authorship culture in places where those
questions are solved by other ways than copyright written texts)
**** - restriction of use for non dangerous usages (some people would
really like to restrict usage for peaceful things).

---

####
# 2. Some begin of answers
####
> Not only document your product in terms of product drawings/design
> files, but also as the expression of an idea, in the way a research
> article describes ideas. 
Yep: more precisely, a pedagogic document would be better.
Or, transform the "thing made with atoms", not as a functional thing,
but as an artistic thing, and publish it under the Licence Art Libre.
Unfortunately, if one part of your artistic thing, is patentable, then
you will fall into the patent swimming pool.
Choosing a thing as being not inventive, assembling things available in
the market in a different way that it could exist, for an artistic
purpose, for artistic places, might be a good idea.
Should we consider "Open Hardware" as a collective way of love art to
transform the world, to conserve human and biosphere ? Open Hardware: an
global artistic project ?
> If I'm not mistaken, such a description can then serve as prior art in
> case someone else applies for a patent? 
Not really: if there is something which is patentable inside your
pedagogic document, then it could have already patented in the past, or
will be in the future.
> And how then can we point patent attourneys to the existence of it (it
> would be best if they find it when they do their search for prior art
> thing)?
That is one of the key. The day we will find a neutral place where we
will deliver a service which will officially publicly publish (ie: as
requested by any judge, by any court) the root information (ie:
equivalent of source code and object code) about the production of a
thing made with atoms, then we will reach a big new step: it will give
us a solid canvas, flooding the patent database around the world.
The service defensive.publication.org does this for software patentable
things.
> If there pop up ways of "enforcing" someone using my invention (can
> this be done by putting the description of the invention under a OHL?
> I think TAPR OHL aims at this?) or designs to open up their hardware
> too, it would be great as this is what many seek to do as far as I
> read this list.
>
CERN-OHL and TAPR-OHL discussion lists, will certainty give you some
great returns (across the discussion list of CERN-OHL and TAPR-OHL).

However, both OHLs licences, are useful to use, when you have the
*complete* rights above the thing you publish. That means, when a part
of your hardware is patentable, then, to get the complete right, you
should get patent rights on this part. That also means, you should have
(as an evidence) the legal ability to publish, which means, your
complete ID must be clearly given: judge and court, will request this as
a basis. That also means, the judge will also firstly check under which
law the publication has to be seen: copyright ? or patent ?

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