An interesting hack is described near the end:<p><pre><code> Jim Myers began breeding a plant he now calls “The O.P.,”
which stands for “open-pollinated.” Until then, his broccoli
were either hybrids or inbreds, created by a process of
narrowing the genetics until one select mother is bred with
one select father to create a single, most desirable combination
of genes. The O.P., by contrast, is the result of a
horticultural orgy. Myers began with twenty-three different
broccoli hybrids and inbreds, including some of the lines
behind the exserted-head trait. He let insects cross-pollinate
them en masse, and the resulting plants were crossed at random
again—and again, and again, four generations in a row. He then
sent germplasm to farmers around the country, had them grow it
in their fields, and send back the seed they collected. Over
the winter, Myers bred it in another greenhouse orgy, then
sent it back to farmers. For six years, he repeated this process.
The broccoli evolved in two ways simultaneously. The
back-and-forth of the breeding scrambled the plants’ genetics,
making the germplasm wildly diverse. It also let the environment
whittle away at individual genes. For instance, plants without
pest resistance produced less seed or simply died, reducing
their presence in the gene pool. When it was hot, plants that
could tolerate heat produced more seed, increasing their
presence. Survival of the fittest.
In the seventh year, Myers sent most of the seed back to the
farmers—just gave it to them, without licenses, royalties or
restrictions. The idea was that each farmer would adapt that
dynamic gene pool to his or her farm’s particular climate and
conditions, selecting the best plants every year to refine the
population. In other words, they could breed it themselves. In
time, each would end up with his or her own perfect broccoli.
The beauty of the O.P. is that rather than challenge the
intellectual-property system, it inherently rejects the concept
of ownership. It contains many of the desirable genetics of
Myers’s commercial broccoli lines, but in a package that is
designed to be shared, not owned. Because it is open-pollinated,
not a hybrid, its seeds can be saved by any farmer. And because
it is genetically diverse, it would be difficult to pin down
with a patent. Even if someone did claim to own it, because each
new seedling is a little different, that claim would be all but
impossible to enforce. In this case, the plant’s natural
instinct to mate, multiply, change—to evolve—isn’t an impediment
at all. Rather, it is a central reason why people would want to
grow it in the first place.
</code></pre>
I like that it is the exact opposite of their other strategy. Instead of going down a road where "the tools of the master are repurposed in a way that... actively subverts the master's hegemony", the plants are bred in a way that makes the tools of the master obsolete and useless.<p>Is there an equivalent anti-patent strategy for software?