[pp.int.general] Patent system similar to GPL?

[Richard Stallman]

    There is something similar in the idea of licensing patents for free
    use to the general public - not copyleft, but perhaps more comparable
    to BSD-type licenses.

Patent law is different from copyright law on this point (as on every
point).  Copyrights exist automatically, whether you want one or not.
If you want to write some text and not restrict its use, you need to
take some step to give permission for all the uses that copyright
automatically forbids.

However, patents issue only in response to an expensive application
procedure.  If you have an idea, and you intend to let the public use
the idea freely, why spend the money?  It is enough just to publish te
idea so that no one else can patent it.

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation
51 Franklin St
Boston MA 02110
USA
www.fsf.org, www.gnu.org