Having said that, I should clarify that the patent worries that I fear are that some non-OSH supporter sees my ideas, patents them, and then makes them proprietary. I've no intention of patenting my own ideas unless it turn-out to be (with free/open licensing) the only way to ensure that the ideas are not made proprietary by someone else.
Thanks for the clarification James, I apologise for getting the wrong end of the stick!
Over the years I've heard of various prior art registry/crowdsourcing effort, nothing seems to stick around though.
Thank you.
Best regards,