Last month, the specialised appeals court that hears US patent cases issued a decision that to all but the geekiest would have seemed as dry and as insignificant as dust.  It was about the validity of a certain kind of licence. Hardly summer blockbuster material.  Worse still, the protagonists were model railway enthusiasts (strike two!) who also were computer programmers (strike three!). Yet the case may come to be remembered as one of the most important decisions in laying down the ground rules for the distributed creativity that the web enables.