
University of Glasgow gives away software, patents, consulting - fogus
http://www.gla.ac.uk/news/headline_181588_en.html
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arethuza
I've always been rather surprised as to why all UK universities don't give
free access to all of their IP produced through taxpayer funded research to
all and any UK taxpayers.

Even better, do the research publish the results in the appropriate forums and
let anyone anywhere do what they want with it.

Of course, if the research is paid for privately then that's completely
different. But for publicly funded research - make it public.

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pjy04
This is insane... lots of possibilities

[http://www.gla.ac.uk/businessandindustry/technology/easyacce...](http://www.gla.ac.uk/businessandindustry/technology/easyaccessipdeals/)

That list sums it up

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fanf2
It would be better if they didn't waste money patenting it in the first place!

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alex_stoddard
I am not so sure, at least for properly tangible patents.

There are considerable risks and costs to developing a technology from a
demonstration in a university department to something marketable.

If companies especially of small to medium size, or their investors, don't
have patent protection they may consider the investment not worth the risk of
being "beaten to the punch".

A university granting royalty free IP may be the best of both worlds in terms
of openness and practicality. IP is free to anyone willing to take the risk
but then they get to take a crack at it knowing the idea is protected.

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arethuza
Actually, you might have a point there - looking at how Google licensed
PageRank from Stanford seems pretty similar to this scheme.

I wonder who paid for that research though!

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JanezStupar
I guess that Google has paid and will continue to pay back its investment
many, many times over.

