Twitter essentially created a Hippocratic Oath for patent usage (that is, for its employees who are developers concerned about unethical offensive use of softwa

Twitter essentially created a Hippocratic Oath for patent usage (that is, for its employees who are developers concerned about unethical offensive use of software patents): https://blog.twitter.com/2012/introducing-innovators-patent-agreement https://blog.twitter.com/2012/introducing-innovators-patent-... The patent language says it's "a commitment from Twitter to our employees that patents can only be used for defensive purposes." Extending this more broadly would say "a commitment to our employees that the code they write can only be used for non-spamming purposes." The problem, of course, is that it's pretty easy to tell whether a patent is being used defensively or offensively. Defining spam (or more difficult yet, privacy) is a bit more slippery.