Ethics and IP

1. Ethics and IP Young Faculty Workshop DAC 2009 Janet Meiling Wang Univ. of Arizona

2. Motivations • Share my experience • Play lifelong important roles • Yet always neglected as most of us too busy … • Two related subjects but also very different • Reward innovations, stimulate research, benefit public

3. Some symptoms • Plagiarism • Happens in every country, every department, every course and unfortunately more or less every research group • Violates IP • Cheating in exams • Fake experimental results • Without referencing • Last minute, delete others name as co-PIs

4. How Serious are these problems? • Fall 2008, 34 courses offered in ECE department, Univ. of Arizona, 81 incidents were caught cheating in exams or committing plagiarism. • Pirating books and software happen very often in some countries Nurture students in your courses, Students in your group, and yourself !!!

5. Understanding Ethics • “What makes behavior or policy, morally right or wrong” • no universally acceptable ethical theory • human experience cannot be divorced from experiences of morality • Work together requires agreement or tolerance • Distinct from law and etiquette

6. Importance in Ethics • It is very important to keep a good and positive working environment • The tenure process can be subjective: your image may have big influence in your tenure process !!! • Your career will last 30-40 years. It is long term. So avoid ethic related problems.

7. Collaborate with others • Be honest to yourself and your collaborators and reveal basis of disagreement • Sometimes rule out some options as clearly unethical. You need to protect yourself !! • It is a learning process itself !

8. Publish with others • Who proposed the major part of the idea ? • Who wrote the first version of the paper ? • Who funded this project or the students ? • Discuss the name order beforehand not afterwards ( VERY CLEAR TO EVERY AUTHOR)

9. IP issues • Almost every university has an IP office • Publication/Proposal vs. patent • Takes long time to explain your new invention • Brings in $$$ and fame You need to inform IP office if you are going to start a company

10. Nurture Students • Always spend some time seriously talking about plagiarism in class • Always emphasize on the painful consequences of plagiarism in your group meeting • Try to read your students writing (unfortunately not always possible  )

11. Students Cheating in Exam • Communicate with student in person to find out the fact why and who • Communicate with Vice department head, or associate dean on policies to handle cheating in exams • Write down a memo stating the fact, the proposed measurements • Present the memo to the student WITH vice department head or the associate dean • Sign the memo (student signature, your signature).

12. Tips when things don’t go well • Discuss with the violated authors • Discuss with senior professors on exit solutions • Discuss with department and university on possible punishment etc • Discuss again with the violated authors • Draft a formal statement and apologize what have happened.

13. References • “Ethics and IP”, Michael M. Burgess, Ph.D. W. Maurice Young Centre for Applied Ethics, UBC