Re: Distance Learning and Copyright

From: J Adrian Pickering <jap_at_ecs.soton.ac.uk>
Date: Tue, 7 Jan 2003 18:16:53 +0000

At 11:23 07/01/2003, Fytton Rowland wrote:
> The application of this to research
>publications written by academics in fulltime employment of a university has
>always been a moot point, but custom and practice seems to be that the
>rights belong to the individual, not the university. The current
>controversy is about academics' teaching materials as opposed to their
>research publications.

I quote from this University's Calendar (i.e. its statement of policy)
regards IPR:

'The University will not assert any possible form of ownership of copyright
in books, articles, lectures and other similar works apart from those
specifically commissioned by the University...'

which was trying to express the traditional exemption above.

However, the nasty catch is the 'commissioned by' bit. This implies that if
you are asked to create course learning materials then the normal
interpretation applies: you have been employed to undertake this work and
the employer holds copyright on these deliverables.

Adrian Pickering/
University of Southampton, UK
Received on Tue Jan 07 2003 - 18:16:53 GMT