Kjære alle,
Jeg har fått professor Ben-Yaakov's tillatelse til å distribuere hans
tankevekkende innlegg på det Israelse akademiske nettverket også til
NTNU-debatt.
Hilsen
Lars Svaasand
>Delivered-To: academia_at_techunix.technion.ac.il
>X-Priority: 3
>Date: Fri, 30 Mar 2001 13:56:43 +0200
>Reply-To: "Shmuel (Sam) Ben-Yaakov" <sby_at_EE.BGU.AC.IL>
>Sender: "ACADEMIA, ISRAEL FORUM FOR HIGHER EDUCATION"
><ACADEMIA_at_TECHUNIX.TECHNION.AC.IL>
>From: "Shmuel (Sam) Ben-Yaakov" <sby_at_EE.BGU.AC.IL>
>Subject: WHY CAN'T A COLLEGE BE MORE LIKE A FIRM?
>To: ACADEMIA_at_TECHUNIX.TECHNION.AC.IL
>
>=======> Posted to "Academia"
>=======> An unedited free subscription list
>=======> Caveat lector
>
>Another aspect to university/corporation discussion (Jerry Blaz posting) is
>the futile attempt of the Universities "to make money" by commercial
>activities. Being nonprofit organizations, all Israeli universities have set
>up adjunct companies to commercialize the Intellectual Property (IP)
>developed by the researchers. This is of course not new and certainly
>legitimate. The problem develops when the people running these adjunct
>companies start to feed the management of the university grand ideas (or
>more accurately, illusions) on how the university can make a lot of money if
>(and this is the catch) the researches of the university will be properly
>controlled. So the 'idea' is very simple. The university has researches that
>will invent, the company will file for patents, the rights for the IP will
>be sold and a lot of money will be made.and quickly, ending all the
>financial problem of the university. Before this can be accomplished (so
>argue the companies set to commercialize the university IP), there is this
>'small issue' that has to be taken care of: the researches have to be
>controlled and restrained from 'wasting' the university IP, or God forbid,
>making it public domain (e.g. publishing). To this end the universities are
>mislead into developing new regulations to "control" the researcher. As the
>regulations are being drafted the appetite develops. e.g. researchers should
>not be allowed to serve as consultants in their area of expertise (so all
>their 'inventions' belong to the university) and (why not) graduate student
>(even external) should not be allowed to work in commercial companies that
>have interest in the research done for the thesis.
>
>
>All the above is a fact, not fiction. This trend is now being followed by
>management of practically all Israeli universities including BGU. The IP
>regulations now being developed make mockery of the traditional concept of a
>university. According to these new regulations, the interest and hence
>mission of a university is to commercialize the IP developed by the
>researchers including students and visiting faculty. Gone are the idea of a
>university as center for developing new knowledge for science sake, a center
>for education and a place of academic freedom.
>
>It is obvious to me, and many colleagues with whom I have discussed the
>matter, that all these grand illusions of the universities becoming a
>business are destined to fail. The major reason being the fact that a
>university is an academic institution and faculty members are scientists,
>This is not the framework for doing business in any effective way. Granted,
>there will always be some university researches that have a motivation to
>invent and get involved in industrial activity. In these cases the
>university is certainly justified in asking for a share if the work that was
>done at the university and certainly if the university's company invested
>money to protect the IP. However, treating university professors as private
>property and claiming ownership on their mind seem to belong to other eras
>and to violate modern concepts of freedom right of the individual.
>
>The problem with the commercialization trend is not that it will fail, but
>that along the way the "experiment" will harm the universities. I wonder how
>many faculty members will be ready, for example, to: " notify the university
>company on any new method, algorithm, hardware or software ideas that they
>came across" and "not to discuss these ideas with colleagues or to publish
>them before getting clearance from the company" (all these are in the IP
>Regulations). It is thus obvious that the new IP regulation will put an
>extra, unnecessary and impossible stress on faculty members with the end
>result of affecting their creativity not to mention willingness to cooperate
>with university management.
>
>Following the distribution of the new IP Regulation, this issue in now under
>discussion at BGU. I wonder what is the situation in other academic
>institutions in Israel (and abroad).
>
>Shmuel Ben-Yaakov
>____________________________________________________________
>
>Prof. Shmuel (Sam) Ben-Yaakov
>Power Electronics Laboratory
>Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering
>Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
>
>Tel.: + (972) (8) 646-1561
>FAX: + (972) (8) 647-2949
>Elect. Mail: sby_at_ee.bgu.ac.il
>Power Electronics Laboratory: http://www.ee.bgu.ac.il/~pel
>
Dr. Lars O. Svaasand
Professor of Physical Electronics
Department of Physical Electronics
Norwegian University of Science and Technology
N-7491 Trondheim, Norway
e-mail NORWAY: svaasand_at_fysel.ntnu.no
phone. + 47 73 59 4421
fax. + 47 73 59 1441
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