One of the inescapable facts of free software is that it involves a lot of law - far more than innocent hackers might expect when they settle down for a light bit of coding. That's in part because it is built on the foundation of licences like the GNU GPL, which depend upon copyright for their efficacy (although that doesn't mean that free software couldn't survive without copyright - see my earlier discussion of this point with Richard Stallman.) Unfortunately, it's also because software is impacted by the surreal world of patent law, which seems to spend most of its time considering how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and what exact rhythms they are tapping out with their angelic plates of meat.