The Feinstein project is looking for legal advice on how to set up a General Public License for our work. The Feinstein project is an attempt to engineer a working AR lower receiver (probably reinforced by a thumbhole stock) out of small plastic building blocks, glued together w/ ABS cement. While the project will no doubt continue on to other magazine designs & cartridges after the basic receiver is complete, our concern is to set up the initial design under a GPL, or something similar.

As you may infer from our desire to use the GPL, we are not looking to make money from this, nor do we desire to spend large amounts of legal fees in order to set up a GPL. Any replies are appreciated.

Farmers Fight!

backbencher

Are you trying to protect the 3D CAD files or something else?

Is it possible that you are looking for a Creative Commons license instead of a GPL license?

See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/

No, not worried about CAD files - one's hardly going to use CAD files to build a lower out of plastic bricks.  What I'm trying to protect is the design of the lower, simply so that no one can patent it & then make it unaffordable.

Would Creative Commons accept a firearms design?

GPL is pretty software specific license.  Creative Commons is a more general purpose license, but it has multiple variations so pick carefully.

Patent is easily solved.  I have pm'd my meatspace email address for your use.

I am not a patent lawyer (although I did pass the patent bar exam 20 years ago), but my perhaps outdated understanding is that by making the design public, you will essentially prevent anyone else from patenting it, because your design will become 'prior art' in the public domain that would make any later copy "not an invention". One possible way of doing that may be by making an inexpensive provisional patent application, and then letting it expire in a year, however simply publishing it should be sufficient.

But you might want to couple that with a Creative Commons license which will spell out exactly what others may or may not do with your design. Again, I'm not an expert, but I think that the Creative Commons license applies to copyright (of things such as plans or designs), which is a different type of intellectual property than utilitarian features that may be protectable by a patent (there are also design patents that cover the "look" of an object but not the utilitarian features).

I don't know of anything that would interfere with your use of the Creative Commons license with designs for firearms or firearm accessories.

Sounds like we'd just declare it "In the public domain" and be done with it?  I certainly want others to take the idea, & run with it, improve it, etc.  I just don't want anyone to run w/ it & then lock it up.

And we're up & running.  Thanks for the advice, folks.

http://www.feinsteinproject.org/