Ian,
As an academic related manager (so neither teacher nor researcher) I
assume that everything that I write (teaching material, conference
papers, et al) during Warwick's employ starts off as copyright of
Warwick, although like my academic colleagues this usually shifts
when such things are handed to the publisher. Like Charles I agree
that its not where or when you write the thing but what it is that
determines whether its work done in the course of your employment.
I suspect that we are all in the same boat in terms of the
definition of duties. If I write a chapter on distance education -
particularly if it uses information which I have access through via
Warwick then its reasonable of me to assume that Warwick would like
the option of having a share in this (realistically this is not so
much in money terms but in terms of future access/use of the
material) but if I write something on birth control education (which
I worked in before Warwick - equivalent to your chapter on Welsh
romance of Peredur) using no Warwick-derived experience/data then I
would not expect Warwick to have a claim. If I were to write a
distance learning course on birth control methods then I'd better
get the copyright situation established first!
The problem is that authors are generally so eager to publish that
they are happy to sign over rights that effectively cut their
employers off from using the material in its published form when they
arguably would not have been able to write the thing in the first
place without their University employer. Assuming that one of the
reasons for publishing academic writing in the first place is to
acheive dissemination then the current practice of leaving things in
the hands of publishers is not helpful.
If you've ever tried to track back the rights to something that is
no longer in print then I'm sure that you already know that things
are already not easy or clear. Most of all things are not (dare I
say it?) fair.
Chris
Chris Pegler
DLMBA Manager, Student Services/
WBS Copyright Co-ordinator
Tel: 01203 524215 Fax: 01203 524411
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