Question about documentation and patents

[Chris Travers]

On Nov 30, 2007 11:49 AM, Michael Tiemann <tiemann at opensource.org> wrote:

>
>
> My perception is informed by the fact that I often write documentation for
> things I don't understand.  Just because I document it doesn't mean I have
> the rights to the patents (known or unknown) that the subject matter covers.
>
>

IANAL, but obviously it would depend on the exact wording of the patent
license and whether or not you had the rights to the patents in question.

For example:  The contributors hereby grant you x, y, and z rights to any
patents they have pertaining to the methods or functions described herein
would clearly suggest that, yes, a patent right is granted.

However:  Contributors hereby grant you x, y, and z rights to any patents
that their contributions necessarily rely upon might not, except as would
relate to printing, reproducing, or transferring the documentation in the
formats provided (i.e. if contributor A had patents on features in a certain
XML schema that the documentation was released under, it would seem to apply
to that format, but not to any methods described in the documentation).

In short, I don't think most FOSS licenses grant such patents, but I see no
reason why one couldn't write a license to do that.  Presumably such
documentation-specific licenses would be outside of the approval process and
hence not under discussion here :-)

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers
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