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Patents Education GNU is Not Unix

Universities, the GPL and Patents? 72

Posted by Cliff from the research-for-everyone dept.
nonlnear asks: "I'm about to finish a PhD in Mathematics and am starting to realize that I am not a big fan of my university's policy about inventions, patents, software, and the like. The gist of it is: you invent while working here => we own everything => we will patent everything. I am planning on a career in academia, but am very conflicted about this way of doing things. What Universities out there will allow me to publish (otherwise patentable) software under the GPL?"
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Universities, the GPL and Patents? More

Universities, the GPL and Patents?

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  • UoL (Score:1, Troll)

    by DrSkwid ( 118965 )
    University of Life

  • Not mutually exclusive (Score:3, Informative)

    by HRbnjR ( 12398 ) <chris@hubick.com> on Saturday June 25, 2005 @12:19PM (#12909307) Homepage
    Just because something is patented doesn't mean it can't be released under the GPL.

    The GPL is a licence for granting specific permissions for people to use what *you* (still) own.

    In particular, the GPL (as opposed to the LGPL) only allows non-commercial software to use your copyrighted/patented work, so you can still make a good business licensing it to commercial users.

    That said, the current version of the GPL is great for licensing copyright, but somewhat murky on more complex patent issues in a global market, and that is what is being improved in GPL version 3.

    • Re:Not mutually exclusive (Score:4, Informative)

      by MrResistor ( 120588 ) <peterahoff.gmail@com> on Saturday June 25, 2005 @12:29PM (#12909357) Homepage
      In particular, the GPL ... only allows non-commercial software to use your copyrighted/patented work,

      Please stop spreading this lie. "Commercial", "proprietary", and "closed source" all have seperate, and distinct, meanings, and the GPL only prohibits the last two.
    • In particular, the GPL (as opposed to the LGPL) only allows non-commercial software to use your copyrighted/patented work, so you can still make a good business licensing it to commercial users.

      I'm not sure where you came up with that idea, but as I understand it, if you GPL something, original or derivative, you must include a liscense to use any patents it may contain. That doesn't mean you can't sell the software for commercial gain, but it usually is very difficult to make a profit under GPL condition
    • the GPL (as opposed to the LGPL) only allows non-commercial software to use your copyrighted/patented work
      Gak! Are there still people out there who think this? That's not the case at all. Please go read up on the GPL [wikipedia.org], and could someone make sure that the post no longer be moderated "informative"?
    • Just because something is patented doesn't mean it can't be released under the GPL.

      That's at best misleading. You cannot release something under the GPL if someone else holds the patent on it and doesn't explicitly permit that usage. And if you yourself hold the patent on it, you have to give the recipients a transferable license, otherwise the license isn't GPL even if you call it that.

      In particular, the GPL (as opposed to the LGPL) only allows non-commercial software

      Quite to the contrary: the GPL

  • Most Will...You Just Need To Know How To Start (Score:5, Informative)

    by Noksagt ( 69097 ) on Saturday June 25, 2005 @12:20PM (#12909313) Homepage
    The easiest way to force something under the GPL or other copyleft licenses is to make a derivative work from GPLed code. So consider using the GNU Scientific Library or something similar as your base. Your University will most likely not make you rewrite it and, if they have a legal department, will most likely not ask you to violate the GPL.

    For a good piece on GPL in academia, see Releasing Free Software if you work at a University [gnu.org] by Richard Stallman.
    • You, ah, DO realize that using GPL'd code without legal authority to release it is copyright infrigement--otherwise known in the academic field as plagarism--correct?

      Your university or employer can and should expel/fire you if you try and force them to use a copyleft license they have no intention of using. Just as they can and should expel/fire you if you try and submit "Noksagt Windows XP" as your final project.

      • Re:Most Will...You Just Need To Know How To Start (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Noksagt ( 69097 ) on Saturday June 25, 2005 @01:26PM (#12909593) Homepage
        You, ah, DO realize that using GPL'd code without legal authority to release it is copyright infrigement
        It appears to me that the OP wants to be a post doc or a professor at a University. Typically these people don't have the University administration telling them what to work on. Yes, there are agreements with the administration & with the funding agencies. But there is still a lot of latitude in what they work on. How many academic contracts can you show me which prevent you from starting with copyleft code?

        The GPL itself allows you to make derivative works. It just dictates how you distribute those works.
        otherwise known in the academic field as plagarism--correct?
        Absolutely not. Plagiarism would be violating the GPL. Making a derivative work is not a violation. The ony thing you should have to worry about is the contracts with your University and funding agencies.
        Your university or employer can and should expel/fire you if you try and force them to use a copyleft license they have no intention of using.
        It is pragmatically different in the corporate world in that they DO force both a license and what you work on down your throat.
        Just as they can and should expel/fire you if you try and submit "Noksagt Windows XP" as your final project.
        That would be violating a trademark. Your working on GPL software is not breaking copyrights.

        Still, asking both your University and funding agency for permission to start with GPLed code to accelerate production (and therefore getting more papers out sooner & research done sooner) is a good idea. Most Universities and funding agencies don't view every software project as something which will be sold & see papers & academic discoveries as the real ends. They will therefore be likely to give you permission so you can do your job.
        • Absolutely not. Plagiarism would be violating the GPL. Making a derivative work is not a violation. The ony thing you should have to worry about is the contracts with your University and funding agencies.

          Wrong. Dead wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong.

          Anyone can have just about anything on their local system, that they never show anyone. A researcher can steal quite liberally from someone else in a paper they are writing for practice, or becuase they wanted to just write the paper. None of that's plagari

          • Re:Most Will...You Just Need To Know How To Start (Score:4, Insightful)

            by Noksagt ( 69097 ) on Saturday June 25, 2005 @02:00PM (#12909730) Homepage
            Plagarism is when you publish or submit something and call it your own.
            How, exactly, are you claiming the GPLed code as your own? Many academic papers I read in which the author created a derivative work from GPLed software make it explicit as to what there work is built on & I don't recall saying you should claim authorship for anyhting you didn't write.
            Making a derivitive work, giving it someone else, and not using the GPL *IS* a violation of the GPL.
            And that is why I (and Stallman before me) said it is a good way to release software under the GPL. If you start with GPLed software, you have two choices: keep it in house & don't release it (which many Universities and funding agencies are O.K. with) or release it under the GPL.
            And if you have an agreement that keeps you from doing that,
            As I said, I haven't seen many agreements to that effect in academia.
            How many academic contracts can you show me which prevent you from starting with copyleft code?

            How many academic contracts can you show me that prohibit the teacher from shitting on thier desk? Or stealing money from the administrator's pocket?
            Oh. I guess you haven't seen many agreements to that effect either.
            • And that is why I (and Stallman before me) said it is a good way to release software under the GPL. If you start with GPLed software, you have two choices: keep it in house & don't release it (which many Universities and funding agencies are O.K. with) or release it under the GPL.

              Precisely. A professor making a derivative work under the terms of the submitter's contract would effectively mean that the University owns the derivative work. As it is derivative of a GPL'd program, the University may cho
            • How, exactly, are you claiming the GPLed code as your own?

              By distributing / publishing it without the GPL.

              You might be able to splice a hair between "copyright infringement" and "plagarism", but you'll still be smacked by your boss.

              And that is why I (and Stallman before me) said it is a good way to release software under the GPL. If you start with GPLed software, you have two choices: keep it in house & don't release it (which many Universities and funding agencies are O.K. with) or release it unde
              • You're obviously far-removed from the ivory tower. There's nothing wrong with that, except that you don't know how it works in academia.

                By distributing / publishing it without the GPL.

                And where, precisely, did I advise doing that? As I said--follow the license by keeping your program in-house (which is perfectly legal and in accordance with the GPL) or distribute it under the GPL. I've never been told by the University or a funding agency to develop a program which will be distriuted or which is for-pr

                • And where, precisely, did I advise doing that?

                  Right here [slashdot.org].

                  Three other things worth noting.

                  First:

                  F/OSS is fine with them

                  If F/OSS is fine with your superiors then you don't have the same perspective as someone who doesn't. This entire discussion hinged on what to do if the powers-that-be DON'T like copyleft, for whatever reason they may have.

                  Second:

                  Please also realize that when it IS time to argue against the GPL, you can make perfectly logical and ideological reasons for why one might choose it w
                  • Noksagt: How, exactly, are you claiming the GPLed code as your own?
                    Planesdragon: By distributing / publishing it without the GPL.
                    Noksagt: And where, precisely, did I advise doing that?
                    Planesdragon: Right here.

                    Okay, let's look at the text of the "right here" post. What does it say?

                    The easiest way to force something under the GPL or other copyleft licenses is to make a derivative work from GPLed code. So consider using the GNU Scientific Library or something similar as your base. Your University will mos

                    • So, Planesdragon, would you care to identify the part of the post quoted above which you are managing to read as advocating distributing GPL'd code without the GPL?

                      Sure.

                      The question was "how do I get the university to publish my code using the GPL?"

                      Noksgat's answer was "use the GPL, and force them to do it." Which, in a situation where the University has rights to all work done on their dime (as describied in the article), is an attempted mingling of GPL and non-GPL code to be released without the GPL.

                  • And where, precisely, did I advise (violating the GPL)?

                    Right here. [slashdot.org]

                    Nowhere in that post did I advise attempting to release the code in a way which violated the GPL. Keeping code in-house is not considered distribution.

                    If F/OSS is fine with your superiors then you don't have the same perspective as someone who doesn't. This entire discussion hinged on what to do if the powers-that-be DON'T like copyleft, for whatever reason they may have.

                    This is a fair point, but I describe my experience with multip

          • Plagarism is when you publish or submit something and call it your own. Plagarism is, by a coincidence that probably has something to do with Stallman's experience in academia, triggered by the same act that triggers the requirements of the GPL.

            Plagiarism has little to do with the GPL. You can plagiarize GPL'ed source code without violating the GPL, and you can violate the GPL without plagiarizing.

            For example, you can take an idea out of a GPL'ed piece of source code and publish it under your own name.
        • I do work in academia, and one thing I've noticed is that more and more funding agencies (NSF among others) is that they are more likely to fund your proposal if the proposal states that the software created by the project will be released under an open source license. Open Source is good for the funding agency, as it means that the research will be more widely disseminated, and so will have a bigger bang for the buck. It can also be folded into the 'educational outreach' part of the proposal.

          Once the fun

      • The idea that software code produced as part of academic research could be anything but open-source is appalling. How can the software possibly be peer-reviewed for its merits if its source code is kept secret?

        Personally, I don't trust the results of any research that is based on proprietary, black-box software. Keeping the source code hidden may work in the retail software business, but it simply doesn't cut it in research.

        Show us the source code, or your research is freaking useless.

      • copyright infrigement--otherwise known in the academic field as plagarism

        Actually, plagiarism and copyright infringement are quite different. Plagiarism means using someone else's words or ideas without attribution. Copyright violation is using someone's words without permission.

        Plagiarism is broader in that you need not use someone's exact words to be guilty of plagiarism. Plagiarism can consist purely of taking someone else's ideas. Furthermore, using just a few words without attribution can ma

    • That link: "The University of Texas has a policy that makes it easy to release software developed there as free software under the GNU General Public License. Univates in Brazil, and the International Institute of Information Technology in Hyderabad, India, both have policies in favor of releasing software under the GPL."

      So not only does RMS tells how to go about getting your research under the GPL, he lists a few places where it is the preferred method. Which is what the Slashdot Question was all about.
  • I'm pretty sure the University's position is a popular one. Even Google does it. That's why they give their employees that 20% personal project time.
    • Agreed. All of the universities and companies I've been a part of treat it the same way: you invent it, they get the patent (but they'll probably let you put yr name on it too). If you don't want the university to take a part of it, don't develop your product at the university. Don't use their computers, lab equipment, etc. Do it at home on your own time and it will be wholly yours. Does the submitter expect a job to pay him to develop products that will only benefit him? That's why people start thei
      • Do it at home on your own time and it will be wholly yours

        Not always, and really, not often. Most large universities and corps will clame ownership of all your thoughts on the assumption that even if you do some work at home, you're using knowledge gained at work as well. In any case, it will be in your contract.

  • You need to relax... Seriously, most of academic work goes out to the world for free. Universities have the clause because once in a bleu moon, a really good patent will turn out to be a money maker for the school, and they use the money from those patents to further the cause of academia.

    A provision of the recent Bayh-Dole Act decrees that universities who retain royalties from licensing of a patent share a fraction of the royalties as personal income to the inventors. By law the university's share o

    • University of Dundee, Solar Cells, LCDs, not patented, stolen by some Japs.

      Genius!

    • Example:
      Kent State University in Kent, Ohio held several patents related to the original Liquid Crystal Displays, which were invented there. Every time some geek bought one of them newfangled LCD watches, KSU's Liquid Crystal Institude got a big fat royalty check.

      Here's a link with some history. [ce.org]

      They still have a ton of patents related to LCDs and KSU is one of the top places in the world for LCD work.

      All that was fine with me - many students received outstanding educations as a result.

      I don'
  • Good question. Jennifer Washburn [newamerica.net] might know (about US institutions, at least).

  • University of Toronto (Score:4, Interesting)

    by baronben ( 322394 ) <<ben.spigel> <at> <gmail.com>> on Saturday June 25, 2005 @12:34PM (#12909376) Homepage
    I'm in the process of writing a report for the University of Toronto and recommendations for releasing research as open source. I was told not to even concentrate on convincing them to do it, they're already leaning towards that, but rather to make recommendations on licences. As far as I can tell, no department at U of T says that they own research, and profs and grad students generally have a free hand to release their research as they want.

    U of T is also home to the Knowledge Media Design Institute [utoronto.ca], which is a huge proponent of Open Source. This year they ran a lecture series called Open Source | Open Access which was entirely on the place of open source within the academic community. They're also offering grants to students to work on open source software!

    I'm not sure how good the math program is here, as the maths frighten me. From walking around campus, I do know that we have something called the "Fields Institute for Mathematics", which seems very official and such not. Give it a look, there are worse places to be than downtown Toronto.

    Give me an e-mail if you want some more info on U of T

    • Re:University of Toronto - I'm sorry (Score:4, Informative)

      by baronben ( 322394 ) <<ben.spigel> <at> <gmail.com>> on Saturday June 25, 2005 @01:10PM (#12909519) Homepage
      On further research, it looks like I was wrong. According to U of T's Copyright policy [utoronto.ca] the university holds the copyright to anything "created by an Author in the course of the Author's employment by the University." On the other hand, "For the purposes of this Policy, research and instruction, or the creation of instructional Works, including Instructional Software, undertaken by members of the University's Teaching Staff or librarians shall not be deemed to be made or undertaken in the course of their employment by the University." This leaves me thoroughly confused, which is about par for the course.

      However, in another twist in this dramatic story " Computer Software that is not Instructional Software will be deemed to be an "Invention" under the Inventions Policy, and the rights and obligations with respect to such Computer Software and the disposition of revenues therefrom shall be in accordance with the Inventions Policy." This Invention Policy [utoronto.ca] says that the university essentially everything you make in your office.

      So, we're no different than anyone else, but damn if we don't have the best student union [harthouse.ca] in the greater Canadas.
      • Interesting that you bring up student unions. In Chicago, apparently it is politically incorrect to call them student unions. As a result, my University renamed our student unions from "Chicago Circle Center" and "Chicago Illini Union" to "Student Center East" and "Student Center West".

        Needless to say, everyone ignores the official names.

        Staying on topic, I would like to point you to DJB's page on this issue:

        http://cr.yp.to/patents/tarzian.html [cr.yp.to]

        Apparently my University adopted a similar policy in 200

      • No need to be confused. I'm pretty sure that what they're saying is that somebody who writes something as part of his or her job, that is not research and not teaching material, is engaged in writing a work for hire, so the university gets the copyright. In other words, they're pretty much exempting faculty. The copyrights they are talking about are the ones on the stuff written by Human Resources people or the person hired to write a history of the university or something for the alumni magazine.

  • Our lab has been facing some patent/open source issues in the last year. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the University of Calgary's IP policy makes a lot of sense -- if you invent it, you own it. Ownership of the IP is to be agreed upon by the creators, with disputes resolved by the university. The U generally prefers agreements with a fair split between the primary creators... ie the supervisor should expect at most an even share. Often the students who actually create the IP get a larger shar
  • Even (or especially) if the actual implementation sucks. Just so long as it's enough to break the patent. Pick someone on the other side of the planet. If you're in Norway, pick someone in Brasil; if Japan, maybe Zimbabwe tickles your fancy.

    Then when a patent is effectively unenforceable due to prior art (give it at least a month or so), you tell the university that since the code cannot be patented, you will release it under the GPL, never letting on that you discussed the concept with J Random Khazakstan

  • Lame (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Silkejr ( 856308 )
    That's ridiculous and really messed up that a university would have a policy like that. The whole idea of a university is the dissemination of knowledge, not locking it up in legalities.
  • They kept you fed while doing this and now you're surprised they don't want something back?

  • Pick a UK university (Score:3)

    by keesh ( 202812 ) on Saturday June 25, 2005 @01:30PM (#12909611) Homepage
    We haven't gone the way of the USA. Yet...

  • University of Waterloo (Score:3, Informative)

    by roju ( 193642 ) on Saturday June 25, 2005 @02:15PM (#12909804)
    The University of Waterloo [uwaterloo.ca] in Canada generally makes a selling point of the fact that staff, faculty, students, RAs, etc retain ownership [uwaterloo.ca] of any copyrights or patents that stem from their research.

  • All of them will (Score:3)

    by DynaSoar ( 714234 ) * on Saturday June 25, 2005 @02:52PM (#12909969) Journal
    "What Universities out there will allow me to publish (otherwise patentable) software under the GPL?"

    All of them. It's called publishing your research, something they also require. Write it up and send it to a journal. They require that you turn over copyright of the article to them. Make the code available under GPL and write the URL into the article. If the university wants to fight about it, let them fight with the journal and in the process make it clear to all their employed academics that publishing their work will get them problems. Won't happen.

    You can also team up with someone from a different university and publish collaboration, and let the universities fight for the rights whether they have the same or different policies.

    Also, they cannot prove you invented something while there unless you say so and document it as such for them. I have been involved in research with others, including works in progress and undeveloped ideas, for quite some time. I can honestly tell them that I can't honestly sign such a thing without an equally binding document that says my previous work and collaborations, no matter how much or little completed, don't fall under their 100%. I've successfully used this in commercial settings, and they're much more stringent than universities.
  • The first thing to do is to inquire the licensing arm of the University that you're thinking of joining. I've been at several universities, and they have vastly different policies; One let code go out as free (not GPL) for research use, while requiring licensing for commercial work. They would also give the developers a "cut of the action", as it were, if the code got licensed. One of the others would let NO source go out. The would give you a cut of the action.

    This part is a little off topic, but you

  • I'm not sure about patents, but IIT in Chicago does allow BSD licencing of software written on their paycheck. GPL/LGPL is a bit too dificult for them to get their head around so far... We DO release little stuff with the GPL|LGPL but big stuff seems to go BSD (if its going open source at all).

  • how universities really work (Score:3, Informative)

    by belmolis ( 702863 ) <billposerNO@SPAMalum.mit.edu> on Sunday June 26, 2005 @02:17AM (#12912676) Homepage

    The situation the poster describes is, I think, atypical. In my experience (and I've been faculty for 22 years) virtually all universities concede to their faculty the copyright on what they write as part of their research or teaching. The only situation I can think of in which the university gets the copyright is when a faculty member writes something at the behest of the university. For instance, if you're one of a number of people who write a policy manual, the university will normally hold the copyright on that. But it is unheard of in my experience for the university to hold the copyright on research publications by faculty.

    Patents are another story. Policies vary quite a bit. A common one is that the university has the right of first refusal. If they turn it down, its yours. If they decide they want it, you get a certain percentage of the profit.

    Software, naturally, is sort of in between, being something written and typically protected by copyright, but at the same time more in the nature of a "thing" or a "product". In practice, lots of software is released under the GPL or BSD licenses. Roughly speaking, the less obvious commercial value the software has, the more closely it is tied to your research, and the smaller the group of people who work on it, the more likely you'll be able to release it freely. If you write a compiler for the cool new dysfunctional language you've designed, all by yourself, the odds are they'll never even notice, much less care. If, on the other hand, a bunch of people create something that looks like a product and looks like a money-maker, the university may take a different view of things. If they can argue that you've used a lot of university resources (other than your research time), that will make it look more like it belongs to them.

    People have sometimes gotten into trouble with big projects like this. Stephen Wolfram left Cal Tech when he got into a fight with them over the ownership of SMP, the symbolic math program that he had written, essentially the predecessor to Mathematica.

    My impression is that unless you get involved in things like SMP that look really attractive as products, releasing software is generally not a big problem, though some places will want to use a BSD-type license instead of the GPL. I'd be curious to see if anyone else on Slashdot knows of problems of this sort arising in practice.

  • The obvious answer is to check if there is a similar project already GPL'ed and then work on that rather then inventing something new.

    In that case the university would have to tell you to stop working on the project which is unlikely.

    If there isn't you might consider doing the first parts at home and making that part GPL and then continuing on it at work later on.
  • You can release the source code of a patented algoritm, but you have to release it after the patent become effective. Patents laws require taht there is no prior art, not even by yourself. So you must patente before releasing the code.
  • ... then change institutions. Here (in the midwest at a Research I school), the university takes a pretty good appraoch to the problem and typically works with you (the inventor) to do a 50-50 split on things that you have come out with while working on their network/machines/time/etc. This seems pretty sane to me, as everyone wins - YOU may or may not have had the time and legal muscle to get a patent in and approved, and THEY wouldn't have had the invention in the first place.

    When going for either P

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