1984, today.

Jason told me about this extraordinary story of a guy who took 15 years to solve a problem in his free time, only to find that his employer for 2 years (DSC now part of Alcatel) is suing him for the idea. While this story started a long time ago, it's still plodding on. Although I was sceptical, Time, Wired, and others back his story. What's his idea? A method to convert machine code back to a high level language. Would it help him to GPL it? That would make it available to DSC, but would allow him to come up with the best implementation before they do. Since the idea would be out of the bag, DSC couldn't do very much about it, right? Update: 02/11 12:45 by S : Evan pointed out to me that if he GPL'd the idea, he'd be in contempt of court and stuck in jail.