Today I read seventeen university Intellectual Property policies, which was just about as interesting as it sounds, largely. Except I noticed something I had not expected. Universities do not all share the same idea of knowledge as property. There were three ideas about knowledge as property:
1. The majority of the 17 universities I looked at considered all knowledge produced in their university to be intellectual property. Added to this property, by various legal mechanisms, would be varying levels of protection. The policy, normally, was implemented as the means of protecting this. Thus, knowledge is intrinsically intellectual property, according to this view.
2. Some of the universities saw knowledge as not intrinsically property. That is, knowledge is just knowledge (or something) until it is legally protected, at which point it becomes intellectual property. Some were specific enough to state that knowledge became intellectual property once it was tradeable and therefore in need of protection.
3. The third way was held by just one of the university policies I read through today. It saw all knowledge produced in the university as knowledge “assets” – that therefore belonged to the university – but knowledge did not become intellectual property until it was protected for the purposes of trade.
These 17 universities were not chosen at random, but the reasoning of that selection is not as important here as the relationship between this interpretation of knowledge as property by the universities and this passage from a basic text on intellectual property in Australia:
“The principal danger … is falling into the trap of assuming that any identifiable ‘thing’ must belong to someone. In the present context this translates to the erroneous belief that all fruits of intellectual activity have some intrinsic claim to be treated as property. … [suggests other factors must be weighed to decide on the rights accorded, which answers the other extreme, that] proprietary analysis is fundamentally inappropriate in this area … this goes too far, for it depends on the extent of the rights granted, a point that is true whether or not those rights are described as proprietary”. (McKeogh et al, p. 19)
Whether all knowledge, or just the tradeable bits, is considered to be property is very important.
Tuesday, 31 March 2009
Wednesday, 18 March 2009
Truth
The Harvard crest…contains the single word ‘Veritas’ or ‘truth’ … There is a modesty and economy of purpose here that is appealing, although further reflection may suggest that the pursuit of ‘truth’, however defined, is a highly ambitious goal that may be beyond any human institution.
Ann Monotti and Sam Ricketson (2003). Universities and Intellectual Property. Oxford University Press, p.14
Ann Monotti and Sam Ricketson (2003). Universities and Intellectual Property. Oxford University Press, p.14
Thursday, 12 March 2009
The Gift. More.
The Gift
p. 18 This confusion of personalities and things is precisely the mark of exchange contracts.
p. 22 The gift received is in fact owned, but the ownership if of a particular kind. One might say that it includes many legal principles which we moderns have isolated from one another. It is at the same time property and a possession, a pledge and a loan, an object sold and an object bought, a deposit, a mandate and a trust…
p. 24 The first gift…has the name of vaga, opening gift. It definitely binds the recipient to make a return gift, the yotile …the clinching gift. Another name for this is kudu, the tooth which bites, severs and liberates. It is obligatory; it is expected and must be equivalent to the first gift; it may be taken by force or surprise. One can avenge non-payment by magic… If one is unable to repay, one may, if necessary, offer a basi, a tooth which does not bite through but only pierces the skin and leaves the transaction unfinished.
P. 25 To obtain this vaga [permanent tie to a circular gift-exchange system] a man may flatter his future partner, who is still independent, and to whom he is making a preliminary series of presents. … p. 26 Some gifts of this kind have titles which express the legal implications of their acceptance… To receive it is actually to commit oneself tp return the vaga… For the cause is a great one; the association made establishes a kind of clan link…To get your man you have to seduce him and dazzle him … The underlying motives are competition, rivalry, show, and a desire for greatness and wealth.
p. 18 This confusion of personalities and things is precisely the mark of exchange contracts.
p. 22 The gift received is in fact owned, but the ownership if of a particular kind. One might say that it includes many legal principles which we moderns have isolated from one another. It is at the same time property and a possession, a pledge and a loan, an object sold and an object bought, a deposit, a mandate and a trust…
p. 24 The first gift…has the name of vaga, opening gift. It definitely binds the recipient to make a return gift, the yotile …the clinching gift. Another name for this is kudu, the tooth which bites, severs and liberates. It is obligatory; it is expected and must be equivalent to the first gift; it may be taken by force or surprise. One can avenge non-payment by magic… If one is unable to repay, one may, if necessary, offer a basi, a tooth which does not bite through but only pierces the skin and leaves the transaction unfinished.
P. 25 To obtain this vaga [permanent tie to a circular gift-exchange system] a man may flatter his future partner, who is still independent, and to whom he is making a preliminary series of presents. … p. 26 Some gifts of this kind have titles which express the legal implications of their acceptance… To receive it is actually to commit oneself tp return the vaga… For the cause is a great one; the association made establishes a kind of clan link…To get your man you have to seduce him and dazzle him … The underlying motives are competition, rivalry, show, and a desire for greatness and wealth.
Tuesday, 3 March 2009
More scholar for the dollar: draft chapter
More scholar for the dollar: knowledge in the 1980s
First Draft, 3 March 2009
Introduction: academics' bad name
Relevance, efficiency and the emerging marketplace (1980-1982)
Commercial research and the new-fashioned academic (1983-1985)
Exporting and privatising higher education (1985-1986)
Intervening to instate a free market: Dawkins (1987-1988)
Aftermath: the woes of public and private universities (1989)
Conclusions: universities in a free(ish) market (1990)
As always, any thoughts, please email me.
First Draft, 3 March 2009
Introduction: academics' bad name
Relevance, efficiency and the emerging marketplace (1980-1982)
Commercial research and the new-fashioned academic (1983-1985)
Exporting and privatising higher education (1985-1986)
Intervening to instate a free market: Dawkins (1987-1988)
Aftermath: the woes of public and private universities (1989)
Conclusions: universities in a free(ish) market (1990)
As always, any thoughts, please email me.
The gift
I am starting to think about gifts, for a few reasons.
1. Patterns of exchange, the distinctions between gifts and commodities, their similarities
2. Teaching as gift-giving
3. Universities as gift-culture and the complex systems of obligation that maybe creates.
Thoughts not going that far. These are someone else's, 55 years ago.
Marcel Mauss, The Gift. 1954
10. It is clear that in Maori custom this bond created by things is in fact a bond vetween persons, since the thing itself is a person or pertains to a person … one gives away what is in reality a part of one’s nature and substance, while to receive something is to receive a part of someone’s spiritual essence. To keep this thing is dangerous…because it comes morally, physically and spiritually from a person. Whatever it is…it retains a magical and religious hold over the recipient. The thing given is not inert. It is alive and often personified, and strives to bring to its original clas and homeland some equivalent to take its place.
11. It is easy to find a large number of facts on the obligation to receive…the obligation to give is no less important. If we understood this, we should also know how men [sic…but this is the only one I’ll bother to do, it was 1954…] came to exchange things with each other. … to refuse to give, or fail to invite, is – like refusing to accept – the equivalent of a declaration of war; it is a refusal of friendship and intercourse. Again, one gives because one is forced to do so, because the recipient has a sort of proprietary right over everything which belongs to the donor. This right is expressed and conceived as a sort of spiritual bond. Thus in Australia the man who owes all the game he kills to his father- and mother-in-law may eat nothing in their presence for feat that their very breath should poison his food.
13. the connection of exchange contracts among men with those between men and gods explains a whole aspct of the theory of sacrifice…there has been a natural evolution. Among the first groups of beings with whom men must have made contracts were the spirits of the dead and the gods. They in fact are the real owners of the world’s wesalth. With them it was particularly necessary to exchange and particularly dangerous not to; but, on the other hand, with them exchange was easiest and safest.
1. Patterns of exchange, the distinctions between gifts and commodities, their similarities
2. Teaching as gift-giving
3. Universities as gift-culture and the complex systems of obligation that maybe creates.
Thoughts not going that far. These are someone else's, 55 years ago.
Marcel Mauss, The Gift. 1954
10. It is clear that in Maori custom this bond created by things is in fact a bond vetween persons, since the thing itself is a person or pertains to a person … one gives away what is in reality a part of one’s nature and substance, while to receive something is to receive a part of someone’s spiritual essence. To keep this thing is dangerous…because it comes morally, physically and spiritually from a person. Whatever it is…it retains a magical and religious hold over the recipient. The thing given is not inert. It is alive and often personified, and strives to bring to its original clas and homeland some equivalent to take its place.
11. It is easy to find a large number of facts on the obligation to receive…the obligation to give is no less important. If we understood this, we should also know how men [sic…but this is the only one I’ll bother to do, it was 1954…] came to exchange things with each other. … to refuse to give, or fail to invite, is – like refusing to accept – the equivalent of a declaration of war; it is a refusal of friendship and intercourse. Again, one gives because one is forced to do so, because the recipient has a sort of proprietary right over everything which belongs to the donor. This right is expressed and conceived as a sort of spiritual bond. Thus in Australia the man who owes all the game he kills to his father- and mother-in-law may eat nothing in their presence for feat that their very breath should poison his food.
13. the connection of exchange contracts among men with those between men and gods explains a whole aspct of the theory of sacrifice…there has been a natural evolution. Among the first groups of beings with whom men must have made contracts were the spirits of the dead and the gods. They in fact are the real owners of the world’s wesalth. With them it was particularly necessary to exchange and particularly dangerous not to; but, on the other hand, with them exchange was easiest and safest.
Tuesday, 24 February 2009
Who should do curiosity-driven research? Two debates, 20 years apart.
At the moment a press-release scuffle is going on, between the different types of Australian universities. See http://delicious.com/hannahforsyth/research
The Group (sometimes called Gang) of Eight elite institutions argues that their tradition of research means research funds should be intensified in their institutions. The rest, understandably, think this is pretty self-interested behaviour. But it is very difficult to fully fund research, because there is no end to what is not known. Specific research projects, awarded competitively on the basis of set criteria are not so difficult, but this has very serious implications for academic freedom and the integrity of knowledge.
A colleague once told me of a private institute in another country where scientists are brought in to focus entirely on the research they wish. They have the equipment and assistance they need and may take PhD students, fully funded. They are not allowed to apply for grants, unless they are an early career researcher. If one of these does apply for a grant, they must refuse it (so it can go on their CV, but the money does not corrupt the system). This philanthropic and utopian approach that is dedicated to academic freedom is necessarily elite, in the current environment. But imagining any country funding this in every institution??? This is sort-of what the Go8 is proposing for itself.
This exact same debate happened 20 years ago, interestingly. I just wrote about it yesterday, so I'll paste it below. Sorry it makes for a very long post.
A small part of my first draft: please be forgiving. These events are in 1989:
The scuffle over research was actually about funding, of course, and in the process Penington had criticised the capabilities of the head of the Australian Research Council, Don Aitkin, suggesting “government should find a new role for Professor Aitkin, more appropriate to his abilities”. It was in fact this issue – the transfer of recurrent funds from university to the Australian Research Council for competitive reallocation – that caused Penington to rebel outright. Aitkin’s brief to mould Australian research to a “national needs” was described by Penington as like Greek legend Procrustes “who trimmed or stretched his guests to fit his bed”. On 25th July 1989, he, along with some other vice-chancellors, formed a rebel splinter group from the Australian Vice Chancellor’s Committee, known as the “Tuesday Group” – a group that Bob Bessant hoped would evolve into a lobby group independent of the Vice-chancellors and the salary-focused union. Openly described as a piece of Melodrama by Canberra, Penington assumed a heroic stance, saying that:
But Penington’s focus was on the quality of knowledge produced for the benefit of the community:
Academics at ex-colleges (especially) denounced Penington and the Tuesday group as “elitist”, seeking a return to the “dark ages” – a past (probably not in the dark ages) where “universities were the preserve of the elite”.
This was a problem the Australian Research Council had sought to address in the first place: research funds spread too far and too thinly. But now, because of Dawkins’ other reforms – the end of the binary system – the Council was seen to be exacerbating the problem. Curiosity-driven research is very expensive to fund universally in a very large higher education sector, leading to the suggestion that some curiosity-driven research should be funded in specific and admittedly elite corners of the sector. Penington was not alone in claiming that free inquiry and curiosity-driven research is important to civil society and also leads to important applied discoveries – like the polio vaccines – that but for serendipity, would not have been found. But, this tradition, as observed by Eric Ashby, also shows that this type of research requires leisure – meaning the staff assigned to do it need to be trusted enough to be granted sufficient research time for serendipitous discovery to be possible. This is obviously more expensive than targeted research projects. As Dawkins sought to equalise the sector, making universities out of colleges through amalgamation or by changing their status, the officially classified “university” sector increased, as did the pool of potential researchers. The most obviously efficient and fair way, from Dawkins’ perspective, to fund these was to ask all institutions to compete for funding, with selection based on alignment to the actual needs of the nation.
From Penington’s perspective this had severe problems. Firstly, “national needs” were understood economically, not in terms of contribution to civil society, meaning the outcomes of research were more narrowly understood. Systematically rewarding short-term outcomes would, Penington argued, fundamentally and potentially irrevocably shift the character of university-based knowledge. Even if academics did not apparently deserve the privileges attached to curiosity-driven research, such research is necessary to the community. But privilege is not the point. Accepting that the Commonwealth and State governments could not be expected to fully fund curiosity-driven research by every academic in the (now) massive sector, Penington argued that those universities who had a substantial tradition of academic curiosity and free inquiry would be best positioned to be granted the special task of continuing to do so. Elite, yes – but certainly safer than shifting the character of knowledge. No wonder he felt heroic. But opposition was not only from Canberra. Having finally gained university status, ex-colleges were hardly likely to look warmly on the proposition that a new layer be created on what was almost certainly “above” them. Penington saw this as Dawkins’ “Henry VIII” type plan to conquer the system while it squabbles amongst itself, scrambling for scraps.
The Group (sometimes called Gang) of Eight elite institutions argues that their tradition of research means research funds should be intensified in their institutions. The rest, understandably, think this is pretty self-interested behaviour. But it is very difficult to fully fund research, because there is no end to what is not known. Specific research projects, awarded competitively on the basis of set criteria are not so difficult, but this has very serious implications for academic freedom and the integrity of knowledge.
A colleague once told me of a private institute in another country where scientists are brought in to focus entirely on the research they wish. They have the equipment and assistance they need and may take PhD students, fully funded. They are not allowed to apply for grants, unless they are an early career researcher. If one of these does apply for a grant, they must refuse it (so it can go on their CV, but the money does not corrupt the system). This philanthropic and utopian approach that is dedicated to academic freedom is necessarily elite, in the current environment. But imagining any country funding this in every institution??? This is sort-of what the Go8 is proposing for itself.
This exact same debate happened 20 years ago, interestingly. I just wrote about it yesterday, so I'll paste it below. Sorry it makes for a very long post.
A small part of my first draft: please be forgiving. These events are in 1989:
The scuffle over research was actually about funding, of course, and in the process Penington had criticised the capabilities of the head of the Australian Research Council, Don Aitkin, suggesting “government should find a new role for Professor Aitkin, more appropriate to his abilities”. It was in fact this issue – the transfer of recurrent funds from university to the Australian Research Council for competitive reallocation – that caused Penington to rebel outright. Aitkin’s brief to mould Australian research to a “national needs” was described by Penington as like Greek legend Procrustes “who trimmed or stretched his guests to fit his bed”. On 25th July 1989, he, along with some other vice-chancellors, formed a rebel splinter group from the Australian Vice Chancellor’s Committee, known as the “Tuesday Group” – a group that Bob Bessant hoped would evolve into a lobby group independent of the Vice-chancellors and the salary-focused union. Openly described as a piece of Melodrama by Canberra, Penington assumed a heroic stance, saying that:
Some of my vice-chancellor colleagues feel it is dangerous to be critical of the Government.
But Penington’s focus was on the quality of knowledge produced for the benefit of the community:
Research policies controlled from Canberra, he says, run the risk of being short-term and politically motivated. Had the Dawkins policies been in place during the polio epidemics, research funds would have gone into creating better iron lungs. The discovery of the Salk and Sabine vaccines which eradicated polio were the result of simple curiosity. It is impossible, he says, to dictate creativity.
Academics at ex-colleges (especially) denounced Penington and the Tuesday group as “elitist”, seeking a return to the “dark ages” – a past (probably not in the dark ages) where “universities were the preserve of the elite”.
This was a problem the Australian Research Council had sought to address in the first place: research funds spread too far and too thinly. But now, because of Dawkins’ other reforms – the end of the binary system – the Council was seen to be exacerbating the problem. Curiosity-driven research is very expensive to fund universally in a very large higher education sector, leading to the suggestion that some curiosity-driven research should be funded in specific and admittedly elite corners of the sector. Penington was not alone in claiming that free inquiry and curiosity-driven research is important to civil society and also leads to important applied discoveries – like the polio vaccines – that but for serendipity, would not have been found. But, this tradition, as observed by Eric Ashby, also shows that this type of research requires leisure – meaning the staff assigned to do it need to be trusted enough to be granted sufficient research time for serendipitous discovery to be possible. This is obviously more expensive than targeted research projects. As Dawkins sought to equalise the sector, making universities out of colleges through amalgamation or by changing their status, the officially classified “university” sector increased, as did the pool of potential researchers. The most obviously efficient and fair way, from Dawkins’ perspective, to fund these was to ask all institutions to compete for funding, with selection based on alignment to the actual needs of the nation.
From Penington’s perspective this had severe problems. Firstly, “national needs” were understood economically, not in terms of contribution to civil society, meaning the outcomes of research were more narrowly understood. Systematically rewarding short-term outcomes would, Penington argued, fundamentally and potentially irrevocably shift the character of university-based knowledge. Even if academics did not apparently deserve the privileges attached to curiosity-driven research, such research is necessary to the community. But privilege is not the point. Accepting that the Commonwealth and State governments could not be expected to fully fund curiosity-driven research by every academic in the (now) massive sector, Penington argued that those universities who had a substantial tradition of academic curiosity and free inquiry would be best positioned to be granted the special task of continuing to do so. Elite, yes – but certainly safer than shifting the character of knowledge. No wonder he felt heroic. But opposition was not only from Canberra. Having finally gained university status, ex-colleges were hardly likely to look warmly on the proposition that a new layer be created on what was almost certainly “above” them. Penington saw this as Dawkins’ “Henry VIII” type plan to conquer the system while it squabbles amongst itself, scrambling for scraps.
Tuesday, 17 February 2009
The end of feuilletonism
After sufficient bloodletting and debasement, it came to its end; there arose a more and more powerful longing for ... valid standards, for an alphabet and multiplication table no longer decreed by power blocs and alterable at any moment. ...
This vacuum at the end of a violent era concerned only with superficial things, this sharp universal hunger for a new beginning and restoration of order, gave rise to our Castalia. The insignificantly small, courageous, half-starved but unbowed band of true thinkers began to be aware of their potentialities. With heroic asceticism and self-discipline they set about establishing a constitution for themselves. Everywhere, even in the tiniest groups, they began working once more, clearing away the rubble of propoganda. Starting from the very bottom, they reconstructed intellectual life, education, research culture.
The Glass Bead Game, p. 335
(Think we might be getting to this yet?)
This vacuum at the end of a violent era concerned only with superficial things, this sharp universal hunger for a new beginning and restoration of order, gave rise to our Castalia. The insignificantly small, courageous, half-starved but unbowed band of true thinkers began to be aware of their potentialities. With heroic asceticism and self-discipline they set about establishing a constitution for themselves. Everywhere, even in the tiniest groups, they began working once more, clearing away the rubble of propoganda. Starting from the very bottom, they reconstructed intellectual life, education, research culture.
The Glass Bead Game, p. 335
(Think we might be getting to this yet?)
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