CopyLeft licenses such as the [GPL] are a reaction to the growing trend to claim ownership to ideas. While they rely on IntellectualProperty law such as CopyRight to be effective, they essentially use the law against itself. 

  

 > In no field of IP law can 'ideas' be protected - only the 'expression' of an idea can be protected. The song "Eight Days a Week" is copyright, but that doesn't stop anyone from writing their own song based on the 'idea' of not having enough days in a week to express one's romantic feelings. Therefore IP is not an oxymoron. There is such as thing as IP law - but it is an umbrella for copyright, trade marks and so on. Similarly, the law of tort is an umbrella for things such as negligence, invasion of privacy, and battery. IP law has been used to entrench unfair business practices, limit competition and discourage customer participation. But land law has been used to deny housing to poor people and exploit areas of natural beauty. Any area of law can be misused. The GPL and other similar efforts are laudable, but they are also using the tools of IP law just as much as any monopolist company - it's only the end goal that is different. I'm not a LUG member, and my impression is that open source arguments would be much more persuasive if they were precise, objective and correct in law. -- ~MeganCrocket. 

  

  

  

  

 See also: 

 * [Patent]