“The Role of University Faculty in the OER World,” the 22nd installment of the Impact of Open Source Software Series, was posted on May 1, 2008, by Joel Thierstein. Joel serves as the Associate Provost for Innovative Scholarly Communication at Rice University and Executive Director of Connexions 1. Thanks Joel for a great posting!
In his posting, Joel raises a number of intriguing and interrelated questions that strike at the nature of the role of faculty in society and then again at the nature of the intellectual products of faculty. He then asks about how Open Educational Resources impact the relationship between faculty and intellectual property rights relative to society's legitimate access expectations to the intellectual as sets of faculty. Underlying the connections that he makes, is the understanding that we live in a dynamically networked world (Web 2.0) that enables and relies on the exchange of information and knowledge. At the highest level, Joel shapes his posting with the following questions:
- What is the role of university faculty in society?
- What is the relationship between university faculty and intellectual property rights?
- Should the work of a faculty member be attributed to the faculty member?
- Should others be allowed to make a profit from the work of university faculty?
- Should derivative works be allowed on the work of university faculty?
He then nests other questions within each topic area. I do not want to give the storyline away, but let me mention that the purpose of tenure is an important feature and that the intellectual property issues associated with attribution, commercialization, and control over derivative works strikes squarely at access and the economics of knowledge formation framed as a ecosystem.
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