Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Data Ownership Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)

Overview Why worry about ownership? Who owns ‘your’ data? Written agreements Intellectual Property Principles of Data Ownership Authorship

Why worry about ownership? What do you do if…? – A researcher leaves the project taking the datasets away – and … that was the only copy – A student returns home and refuses to share the data until they have published their thesis – Any other problems you know of…

Who owns ‘your’ data? Sponsor Project Leader Project Institute Researcher / scientist / fieldworker Data manager Respondent Someone else…

Written agreement A ‘Data Sharing Agreement’ or a ‘Memorandum of Understanding’ is necessary It should be prepared at the outset of the project Is stored with the project protocols

Intellectual Property Generally applies to something intangible – e.g. an idea Includes everything from research data to major inventions Protection for IP includes patents, copyright, design rights, etc. For data, the IP is the information contained within the data

Agreed policy should allow… Fully-shared ownership & accessibility of the data to all project partners Data to be accessible to and shared with other potential users Issues of respondent confidentiality Data release to legitimate users external to the project – after a set period of time

Principles of Data Ownership 1 Research data belong to institutes not individuals – because only institutes can ensure long-term security Data generated by collaborating institutions belong jointly to those institutions Data collected using public funds is public property – everyone has a responsibility to ensure maximum value is realised from it

Principles of Data Ownership 2 Scientists generating research data have a right to recognition for their work (Authorship) Scientists generating research data using public funds have a duty to use the data for the purpose for which funding was provided and to publish the findings Data ownership and IP should be managed as to balance interests of scientists, donors, institutions, and society as a whole

Consequences Every dataset must have a clear ownership status Policies and procedures must be in place to allow public access to data Balance between protection of IPR for individual scientists and public access Documenting and publicising data - archiving

Authorship Being named as an author means: But also means: You are recognised for your work You can list the publication on your CV But also means: You are responsible for errors of fact or interpretation You have to be able to defend the publication when it is criticised

Who is an author? An author makes substantial contributions to: Conception & design, or analysis & interpretation of data; and to Drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; and on Final approval of the version to be published

Student work A thesis that is written (authored) by a student – the student is the sole author Papers arising from thesis may be jointly authored BUT student supervision alone does not give the right to claim authorship

Edited volumes An editor is responsible for the quality of the content Must have read, commented on, corrected and approved the whole content Making changes marked by others or changing the layout or presentation is NOT being an editor