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Category Archives: Policy
Look, It's a Thrush!
One of the biggest problems in dealing with university technology transfer is the propensity for people to reason from the names given to things, rather than what the things are. In biology, a truism is that one cannot reason from … Continue reading
Posted in Bad Science, Bayh-Dole, Freedom, Policy
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3 Reasonable Approaches to University IP Policy
There are three relatively well-formed ways that a university might acquire rights to inventions made by faculty. Let’s review, starting with the clearest and simplest. Donation An inventor donates an invention to the university and the university agrees to accept … Continue reading
The Casino Factor
We have been working through how a university might come to acquire patent rights from its faculty. I’ve discussed the problems in the dual monopoly system–comprehensive, compulsory assignment of a broad set of things labeled “inventions” combined with a strong … Continue reading
Posted in Policy, Social Science, Technology Transfer
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Principalities of Patenting
I am working through the ways in which a university comes to acquire patent rights from faculty inventors. This is turning into a series of articles. This stuff isn’t easy–but then, as far as I can tell, it’s not easy … Continue reading
Posted in Freedom, Policy, Social Science, Technology Transfer
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A university's innovation policy depends on academic freedom
Build your innovation policy around academic freedom. The distinctive advantage of a university faculty member is that she or he has access to institutional resources (and so does not have to grub for them personally) but is free from institutional … Continue reading
Notes and Comments on G. Kenneth Smith’s Article on University Ownership of Inventions
G. Kenneth Smith’s 1997 article “Faculty And Graduate Student Generated Inventions: Is University Ownership A Legal Certainty?” on university patent policies is worth the read, even nearly 20 years after it was published. The Bayh-Dole part might be redone, now … Continue reading
Posted in Policy
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The Status of University Patent Policy
What is the status of a university patent policy? Or, put it another way, how does it come about that a university can force faculty and students to give up ownership of their personal property–patentable inventions–property that inventors own by … Continue reading
Posted in Agreements, Freedom, Policy
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The University Dual Monopoly Patent Policy Goes to 11
The current approach to university IP management implemented throughout the United State involves a broad definition of what constitutes an “invention” or “intellectual property” a broad scope for who is required to comply with the policy a policy demand of … Continue reading
Posted in Bozonet, Policy, Technology Transfer
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The Vampire at the Neck
Consider the three elements of the simple mantra I outlined in my last post. Take IP License IP Make Money Let’s work through these three imperatives. Take IP Administrators have expanded the definition of “IP” from patents and copyrights to … Continue reading
Posted in Metrics, Policy, Technology Transfer
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Faculty IP and Academic Freedom, Part I
I am working out how to disrupt the now-pervasive use of management-speak to describe the obligations of university faculty with regard to intellectual property they produce–largely, almost entirely their personal intellectual property, by operation of federal copyright and patent law, prior … Continue reading