[cc-community] The trials and tribulations of an open source medical device

Ed Boyden eboyden3 at gmail.com
Wed Sep 20 16:23:25 EDT 2006


Dear All,

First of all, my apologies if this is a redundant or oft-trod topic,
or if this is the inappropriate list --  I joined the Creative Commons
community only today.  To make a long story short, some colleagues and
I have launched a project to make an open-source medical device,
namely a brain stimulator appropriate for treating depression:
    http://transcenmentalism.org/OpenStim/tiki-index.php

Progress has occurred rapidly, with a systems design in place, and
mathematical models and hardware designs for two of the six
components.  We hope to have a full design ready within a few weeks.
We are hoping to release all this information under a Creative Commons
License.  Furthermore, we are hoping to build a community of people
who will trade protocols and exchange information freely.

One worry, though, is that nothing prevents someone from simply taking
all this content, and submitting a patent or patents on it.  This is
potentially a very lucrative field (one of the applications is
essentially a side-effect free substitute for Prozac), and our hope
was to build a community of researchers and clinicians, as opposed to
providing the means for someone else to simply walk in and create a
monopoly.  Any thoughts on this front?  Are the goals of this project
mutually inconsistent?

Any and all thoughts are welcome.

Best,
Ed

-- 
Edward S. Boyden, Ph. D.
eboyden3 at gmail.com


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