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So consider after I experiment for 1000 hours in Poser and I tell you (as I have told you) that 7 is the optimum number of AO samples to use in an AO node. You may use 7 in your work, but you must not publish this number, 7, to anybody else. It is possible that the result of some terribly difficult, expensive, and time consuming research is intellectual property. And nobody would argue if such research led to a copyrighted 100 page document, right? But what if the result of the research (remember, thousands of hours) is just one number, or a few numbers, or 30 numbers? Where do you draw the line?

before i post everything else i hope you are aware that we are thankfull to you what you all did here. and if you would start selling VSS people would buy it.

but now back to the post. how can you proove that you worked 100 hours on AO? how can a setting in AO be copyright? its a number that you type in a window.
i could now say to someone hey i also worked hours and i think 7 is correct.  an example of course.