IPhone App Raises Questions About Who Owns Student Inventions
chronicle.com
chronicle.com
During my senior year I invented some technology on my own time. A couple years ago a professor from the school found out about this at a conference we both attended, and subsequently I was contacted by one of the school's lawyers who indicated they believed they owned my invention and I was in violation of the school's rights. Fortunately I still had my signed paper and they realized they would never be able to prevail in court.
If you have any intention whatsoever of doing creative original work of any sort in college either on campus or off (or even in a part time job off campus), you need to get it IN WRITING that the university will not assert IP rights. If they will not give this to you signed and in writing, do not write a tuition check. Find another college, or better yet, skip college entirely. It is a complete rip off.
For example here is how my University defines Patents (or IP)
Inventions involving the use of funds, space, personnel, equipment or facilities administered by the University, but without any University obligations to others in connection with such support, are the property of the University.
And the income? Let's just say you dont want to make a lot of money off of something you create.
A.1 Schedule of Net Income Distribution
For the first $10,000 of net income:100% to the inventor.
For the next $500,000 in cumulative net income: 50% to the inventors, 25% to the Office of the Vice Provost for Research and Dean of Graduate Policy, 25% to the inventor's Institutional Unit(s)
For the next $1,000,000 in cumulative net income: 40% to the inventors, 35% to the Office of Vice Provost for Research and Dean of Graduate Policy, 25% to the inventor's Institutional Unit(s)
For cumulative net income in excess of $1,510,000: 25% to the inventors, 50% to the Office of Vice Provost for Research and Dean of Graduate Policy, 25% to the inventor's Institutional Unit(s)
I wish more universities would follow in the footsteps of the University of Missouri at Columbia and be more relaxed on there IP rights. It would encourage students to produce better work and could possibly give the university a better name if the students work becomes popular. For example how many times have you read an article where it say "John Doe, a graduate of No Name University, created product while a student."
Full details:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ilfjD3zn6I...
What was the written policy for undergrad ip previously? There wasn't one, is that correct? And since there wasn't one the university actually didn't own any undergrad work at all since undergrads are not employees of the university and it is not work for hire and they have not contractually agreed to any other arrangement.
So what really happened is the university's lawyers realized there was no legal basis for their claims at all.
Rather than drop the claims though they chose to revise the policy asserting claims.
> Missouri relented in Brown's case. It also wrote rules explicitly giving student inventors the legal right to their unique ideas developed under specific circumstances. If the invention came from a school contest, extracurricular club or individual initiative, the university keeps its hands off. If the student invention came about under a professor's supervision, using school resources or grant money, then the university can assert an ownership right — just as it does for faculty researchers.
So now there is a policy in place that undergrads must contractually agree to as part of agreeing to university rules, which in many cases gives ownership to the university of undergrad work which was not the case before, such as if "using school resources" like their internet connection or student lounges or done "under a professor's supervision", which was never the case before for unimportant undergrad work.
Undergrads haven't traditionally done original valuable research or development. Universities have realized that they do and they want a cut of it. There is no justification for it in the common law, so they are asserting the rights contractually now, while issuing press releases claiming that they are making things better for students, which is actually propaganda since the opposite has just occurred. Something of a common PR tactic to do this.
Tech Transfer offices nationwide have all been left scratching their heads about the issue raised by this article. However, most TT officials have little hands on development experience within the past 5 years or more; they're completely oblivious to modern trends in entrepreneurship. When in doubt, they often are too strict. Likely, Mizzou has adjusted their policy to retain some ownership rights of all of the "work students do as part of a class, to student work created as part of a competition, to work students do in an extracurricular group that is sponsored by the university."
The nationwide advisory branch (AUTM) may claim that they don't want to hold student work, but it's decided at a university level. When universities begin to see lost potential revenue, they'll want a piece of it.
My advice to students is to not use university resources for anything unless you have to. Use your own computers, get a "work" email off of the school's server, and perhaps do your work via a coffee shop's WiFi instead of the school's. It may seem extreme, but it's better safe than sorry.
And this is part of the dilemma right? Being in the school environment is clearly a priceless opportunity to find and work with great colleagues. Very important to find out if you'd make it with these people after you're bumped out of the safe harbor that is academia. So, waiting till graduation is a cost with its own potential risks and drawbacks.
I agree that we should be cautious and try to minimize the footprint we leave for the school to point out. But the hurdle to truly separate everything is quite high, and given the options it's probably going to end up a situation where you just have to do what you do in stealth mode to some extent. At least until Universities address this issue very explicitly and clearly.
It's great that this issue is being raised. Perhaps there needs to be more student advocacy to take this issue forward and work with Universities to articulate very clear guidelines of what is acceptable and not. Like you said, the old models don't reflect the nature of entrepreneurship today and the nebulous boundaries are keeping people from charging ahead on the things that matter most.
Having said that, schools that still enforce a policy like that are only hurting themselves by discouraging entrepreneurship, and it's only a matter of time until all schools have similar IP policies as this one. I'm lucky my university strongly believes in encouraging entrepreneurship and does not assert any ownership over student work, even if university equipment is used.
I think there is a gaping hole in this argument. When you go to a college/university, you are entering an environment of learning and exploration, both personal and intellectual. It's not just an "education" in the sense of "book knowledge." Some unis have policies dictating where you can live, whether or not you can drive a car, and have disciplinary policies for violating certain rules (read: drinking) that have to do with this environment, not with intellectual education.
And I completely agree with you that schools that try to get it both ways and deny the student the fruit of their complete growth, including entrepreneurship, are doing them a disservice.
Do athletes that turn pro based on the skills they develop in college have to tithe their salary back to the school?
EDIT: I obviously need to make it clear that I am continuing your point, not disagreeing.
Your athlete analogy sums up the issue perfectly.
I suspect that in many cases there was no such agreement, but universities get students to transfer ownership by signing letters of understanding after being threatened with scary lawsuits. Basically a mob shakedown. That was the situation in my case, there was nothing I agreed to in writing, but they asserted they had such rights and intended to sue if I didn't sign over ownership. Just that they question ownership publicly is probably enough to ensure that former student led ventures never acquire funding or are abandoned due to the uncertainty.
Nowadays clicking buttons on web sites is considered by some courts to be the same as signing a written contract, so this might be another way to get students to agree to absurd things, the same way many internet based companies do.
Without a legal agreement the rights are held by the creators of the work. Since it is not work for hire because undergrad students are not employees, the students own the work. Grad students on the other hand are usually employees and also have signed contracts explicitly turning over ownership of work, so how it works is more clear there.
For the misinformed, the article talks about how the university went ahead and fixed it's policies at the request of the students and faculty to ensure that they had the rights to distribute the app.
This sort of action will indeed encourage students.
"In the last paragraph of the linked article, name the person quoted."
Universities may think they are the government, but I don't see how they acquire such rights, legally. Are students considered the university's slaves?