Even more: in practice, in the engineering world, everyone shares what they know because they can only benefit from doing so. So even if you can keep secrecy at first (which might actually make sense at the very beginning), chances are at some point you will start benefiting much more from openly sharing what you have. I'm not saying that hypothetically, that's what actually happens in the engineering community at large. I benefit myself from it lavishly and give back as much as I can in return. It's like zapping! :)

didiplaywell

Credit is manageable. Using the same line of thought to prohibit someone to even repeat your words is insane. And it's fully hypocritical, because no patent pays to the bibliography it's based on. You do can keep secrecy, that's for sure.

alter_native

The Absurdity of Intellectual Property Laws

Undisciplined

I think it's part of the "everything I don't like should be illegal" mindset. 

It doesn't feel good to see someone else getting credit for something you did first. Social norms can take care of that, though, by shaming people who pretend to have created something when they should have given attribution.