Category Archives: Commons

Go West for Innovation!

Here is the biggest outcome of Stanford v Roche: Bayh-Dole does not require universities to take ownership of inventions made with federal funds, does not mandate that universities do so, does not restrain the rights of inventors so they can … Continue reading

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Cities of Innovation

Geoffrey West in Edge 343 (WHY CITIES KEEP GROWING, CORPORATIONS AND PEOPLE ALWAYS DIE, AND LIFE GETS FASTER): “Well, Google is a bit of an exception, because it still tolerates some of that. But most companies start out probably with … Continue reading

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Five Key Elements of Open Innovation

I work with five key elements in open innovation business models: critical mass congestion externalities weak ties drivers Critical mass is a restatement that open doesn’t matter if it’s solitary. There has to be at least another player. Generally, a … Continue reading

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Opening up technology transfer

Open innovation presents challenges to conventional forms of university technology transfer, even as the conventional forms are a start at open innovation. Continue reading

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Fragmentation

When a bunch of universities file patents on bits and pieces of an area of research, such as has happened in nanotechnology, who are the big winners? That is, there is a commons made of patent claim thicket. No one … Continue reading

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Patent Fair Use, Commons, and Research Inventions

Madey v. Duke wasn’t a good thing for research. Essentially, it put an end to the idea of a research use exception to patent claims. Whatever the merits of the case, there is no question in my mind that it’s … Continue reading

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Taking it to the Street

Jane Jacobs wrote one of the definitive critiques of central planning in her The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Fifty years on, the work still hits home. In DLGAC, Jacobs starts with the life of the street, arguing … Continue reading

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What Happens Here is Excluded Here

I was in Mexico recently as part of a 5 week training program for new technology transfer professionals. Our piece of the training was negotiation and licensing. The participants had brought with them real world examples from their own institutions–opportunities … Continue reading

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Research- [ of | on | with ]

There’s one more important area of research invention use, and that is as a research tool. In the practice, we can differentiate three kinds of tool activity, in addition to throwing bones into the air and heading for monoliths orbiting … Continue reading

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Cooperative Competition

The Tour de France finished up at the end of July. The strategies of bicycle racing help to illustrate the practical nature of competition. In bicycle racing, there’s a mechanical advantage in being behind another racer. Trailing racers move into … Continue reading

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