[open-science] Proof to funding agencies (companies) that open work is a good idea

Fri Jul 12 12:49:26 UTC 2013

Jason - I'm interested in a similar question of how to convince
universities to allow or even better support open commercialization / open
innovation.  When making your arguments, they care about money first, then
publications, then collaborative opportunities in that order.  Here's my
suggestions:

1) FUNDING: The federal government is now requiring openness for federally
funding research.
http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2013/05/13/how-unique-is-the-new-u-s-open-data-policy/.
 That means if states are interested in getting federal funding, they
should pursue consistent policies.

2) EXAMPLES: The best example I could find was Arduino.  Arduino is a
microcontroller platform that has become incredibly popular, and was
developed out of the Design Institute in Ivrea Italy (a university).  It is
open in it's hardware, software, and design, and is successful because it
was open and effectively created a user community who also helped design,
market, and add on to the original unit.  This enabled an Ivrea electronics
factory (one of the first in the world, but one of the last left in italy)
to continue to produce something which is otherwise almost exclusively made
in China and places where labor is cheap.

3) LOWER COST: No need to patent, license, etc. means you save at least
40k, but it's actually much more than that.  If you comb through this -
http://www.cherrycommission.org/docs/Resources/Economic_Benefits/2nd.Annual.medc_tech-transfer.assessment.pdf
you can find some data about the average cost per patent and per license,
at least for 3 unviersities in michigan during the period of this study.
Needless to say, it's expensive and while it may pay off for a few
universities who get the rare home run (for MSU, a single cancer drug
patent accounts for the vast majority of the income in their portfolio - if
not for that they'd be underwater), it does not pay off for most.

4) BRANDING/MARKETING: Open data means more people are going to see your
work - that means more people see the universities name.

5) EASIER MORE FLUID COLLABORATION --> FASTER/BETTER RESEARCH:
Patent/license restrictions slow continued research down to a standstill.
If you open up the information it should mean more papers published from
your university.

6) CONCEPT: This is the weakest argument from their perspective,
unfortunately :)  But if you're at a public university, you should mention
that it's public money and few other parts of the government are allowed to
create intellectual property for the sole benefit of a single company
(imagine if that happened in the accounting department, or the department
of education...!).

Other resources I can think of that make these kinds of arguments and have
examples:

p2pfoundation.net
sensorica.co

I recently had a discussion at MSU about open commercialization and the
recorded version is here.   It was interesting because the head of our Tech
Transfer department was there, so getting his perspective was very useful.
The link to that is here:

http://msuglobal.com/2013/07/video-open-source-technology-in-science/

I'm trying to write-up a generalized argument for why U's should support
open commercialization at P2Pfoundation.net and hope to have it up soon
(when I find the time).

Hope that helps -

Greg

-- 
Greg Austic

2198 Seminole Dr.
Okemos, MI 48864
(919) 545 1083

www.austiclabs.com
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