Originally posted by: Derek Morrison on Jan 17, 07 | 7:24 am |
In my two previous postings I attempted to make some sense of the trend towards patenting software of relevance to learning and teaching. As is now well known, commercial entities are attempting to claim intellectual ownership of apparently prosaic (and certainly now ubiquitous) functionality. But what about the role of Higher Education in invention? David Edgerton’s new book Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History since 1900 offers a revisionist polemic. Edgerton adds another dimension to our consideration of issues relating to attempts to exploit IPR. He asserts that durability and cost-benefit for the majority is what matters rather than a constant stream of technical innovation which promise much, but in the end delivers little in the long term.
To give readers a flavour of his views, in a related press article he controversially states:
…. for all the hype about “Mode 2” and entrenpreneurial institutions the role of universities in invention was and remains marginal … The small minority of US universities that make significant income from intellectual property derive it from federally funded health research, which provides them with far more income than they get from patented innovations. The significance of academic research has been exaggerated in our historical accounts of invention … And it is no accident that those technologies in which academic invention has played a role are the ones around which the standard stories have been built … we should resist the politics of the gimmick and fake novelty. (The hosepipe and other revolutionary icons, Times Higher Education Supplement, 12 January 2007 – registration required)
Although Edgerton’s book doesn’t however consider the impact of new communications and publishing media on education it does serve as a timely reminder that even the shiny iPod (or variants thereof) wont necessarily be as transformative in the long term as technophiles/neophiles might currently think. Viewed from that perspective, the VLE/MLE may never have the same significance or potential societal impact as the advocates or companies trying to lay intellectual claim to this territory may like to think.
