[OpenDesign] question on the definition scope

Sat Nov 24 21:09:56 UTC 2012

Hi all

>> I agree with Tom and Peter about the important difference between
>> Intellectual Property (copyright) and Industrial Property (patents).
>>
>
> WIPO define Industrial Property as a sub-category of Intellectual
> Property, alongside Copyright:
>
> http://www.wipo.int/about-ip/**en/ <http://www.wipo.int/about-ip/en/>

Yeah, right! Thanks for the correction, Rob.

  An interesting thing to bear in mind is that "freedom" and
>> "openness" don't mean the same, and that they can be applied in a different
>> way at
>
> different parts of the design process.
>>
> "Open Source" was a deliberately corporate friendly re-branding of Free
> Software. To the extent that it is meaningful it does mean the same thing,
> its name just emphasises the means rather than the end.
>

That's right, but I was referring to the "clean" concepts and not only to
the "open source software" vs. "free software" debate. If we take
conventions used in software out of both terms, being "open" shouldn't
necessarily imply being "free", and vice versa. Usually, you can see
openness as a requirement for achieving freedom, but the latter seems wider
in scope to me, so it wouldn't be out of the question whether we should be
talking about "open design" or "free/libre design".

Anyway, I assume the Open Design Definiton is using "open" as "free", as is
done in software, right? Not that I want to take the discussion to a level
that may be out of scope here...

BTW, I just joined Github to see what's going on there :)

Best,

Jorge
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