Unless the University is paying you specifically to perform a role which directly contributed to (and would thereby benefit from) the IP, the IP cannot be considered Work For Hire [they didn't hire you to do that -- it'd be like considering a newborn as a company asset because the the parents were employed at time of conception/birth].
So, under that line of reasoning (barring entry contracts in which the University leases the sum & total of your mind thus making _everything_ you do "work for hire"), you should be able to protect your work from administrative interlopers by simply putting the first specific drafts of it under a license [any license] before anybody else can. Until the University agrees to the license (and therefore admits they have no claim on the IP), you don't have to give them access to it -- and if the IP is actually worth getting at, they would probably rather play along than let you offer it to another University or Corporation.
[The expectation is that you're either valuable to their academic reputation or you're paying them for the educational experience.]
That's my $.02 on my $.02!
A method of protecting a weak business plan by hiring enough Yes-people[1] to sway public opinion into believing that the plan is viable long enough to allow the business IPO to carry itself. After the IPO the business plan will be too valuable to fail, even as it loses money hand-over-fist for several years in a row during which time this patent will be used to sue other competitors immediately following their IPO, thus putting them out of business while boosting the business revenue and therefore stock value.
[1] The Yes-people may be lawyers, marketers, elected or appointed officials, or simply write convincing letters to publication editors.
(I should be able to get at least Digital Convergence, Amazon and Rambus with this, in that order. They won't want to qualify as prior art as they're not willing to admit that they've got a weak business plan [it'd be bad for stock prices]).
Slashdot Mirror
Unless the University is paying you specifically to perform a role which directly contributed to (and would thereby benefit from) the IP, the IP cannot be considered Work For Hire [they didn't hire you to do that -- it'd be like considering a newborn as a company asset because the the parents were employed at time of conception/birth]. So, under that line of reasoning (barring entry contracts in which the University leases the sum & total of your mind thus making _everything_ you do "work for hire"), you should be able to protect your work from administrative interlopers by simply putting the first specific drafts of it under a license [any license] before anybody else can. Until the University agrees to the license (and therefore admits they have no claim on the IP), you don't have to give them access to it -- and if the IP is actually worth getting at, they would probably rather play along than let you offer it to another University or Corporation. [The expectation is that you're either valuable to their academic reputation or you're paying them for the educational experience.] That's my $.02 on my $.02!
A method of protecting a weak business plan by hiring enough Yes-people[1] to sway public opinion into believing that the plan is viable long enough to allow the business IPO to carry itself. After the IPO the business plan will be too valuable to fail, even as it loses money hand-over-fist for several years in a row during which time this patent will be used to sue other competitors immediately following their IPO, thus putting them out of business while boosting the business revenue and therefore stock value.
[1] The Yes-people may be lawyers, marketers, elected or appointed officials, or simply write convincing letters to publication editors.
(I should be able to get at least Digital Convergence, Amazon and Rambus with this, in that order. They won't want to qualify as prior art as they're not willing to admit that they've got a weak business plan [it'd be bad for stock prices]).