Hi Jay, this is very rapidly slipping off-topic, but FYI: On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 04:34:17PM -0500, Jay Salsburg wrote: One of the typical reason is quite simple and (unfortunately) understandable: If you openly document how your hardware works, then you are inviting patent trolls and patent lawsuits. If they can go to court and show your own documentation as evidence, you will have a hard time arguing that the documentation was wrong. If the documentation is not publicly released and under NDA, than any patent troll getting hold of it (and/or their collaborators) would have been violating the NDA. If there is not documentation, then the patent troll would have to actually do silicon reverse engineering and invest money and time before they have evidence. And then that evidence gets questioned, and the process how it was obtained. Possible, but much more effort. The point is not whether a given device infringes a patent or not. The point is simply that there are companies out there who simply pick the easiest targets. And unfortunately those that have open documentation are easier to attack than those that don't :( -- - Harald Welte <laforge(a)gnumonks.org> http://laforge.gnumonks.org/ ============================================================================ "Privacy in residential applications is a desirable marketing option." (ETSI EN 300 175-7 Ch. A6)