(Off-topic-ish) Openness... UCT vs Stellenbosch ... and google.

Hi all

I admit this may be a bit of a trolling exercise, perhaps, but after the entertainment around google this morning and then encountering this in a teaching course I'm doing on the same day, I couldn't resist. :)

Apparently, UCT and Stellenbosch - which STIAS is linked to - have widely divergent thoughts on open access and copyrights.

UCT is open, see their open knowledge initiative (http://open.uct.ac.za/), and, importantly and by the sounds of it fairly uniquely, assign copyright to the creators of the work:

http://www.rcips.uct.ac.za/rcips/ip/copyright/uct_copyright (relevant bits copied below)
http://www.uct.ac.za/continuinged/col/

while Stellenbosch, on the other hand, pilfer these:
http://library.sun.ac.za/English/howdoi/Pages/Comply-with-copyright.aspx (relevant bits below)

This is a bit tongue in cheek as I acknowledge these things are always more complicated and I don't know the details (this article may help? http://sajlis.journals.ac.za/pub/article/view/29) but if we can kick up a fuss over google, I can kick up a fuss over academic freedom.

So with this I wish to say that Stias dropped a lot of points in my venue preferences. I do think that the UCT Breakwater campus may have different IP clauses than the main UCT clauses, being more business minded... so I'm not sure how long one can take the moral high ground on this and still get anywhere.

That is all. (If you feel this violates this mailing list, I'm sorry, won't do it again)

UCT:
Category 2 Examples - Assigned Automatically to and Owned by Authors

Scholarly & literary publications (incl. theses, where students own the copyright)
Paintings, sculptures, drawings, graphics and photographs produced as an art form
Recordings of musical performances
Musical compositions
Teaching/Course materials produced by staff - unless commissioned by UCT. Condition: perpetual royalty-free licence to use, copy and adapt for teaching and research.
Film

Where academics wish to include examination questions in a textbook that they wish to publish, permission for their use should be sought from RCIPS.

- See more at: http://www.rcips.uct.ac.za/rcips/ip/copyright/uct_copyright#sthash.vdYjrH8k.dpuf

Stellenbosch:

Who owns the copyright of my work at Stellenbosch University?

Paragraph 2.2.2 in the Policy now reads as follows:

Students assign to SU their copyrights in all works that may be created in the course of the execution of their study obligations (including all research conducted as part of such studies). These include, inter alia, all presentations, assignments, test and examination scripts, papers, dissertations, theses, sound recordings, video recordings, software, databases, designs and models developed by students in the course of their studies. In this regard, the requirements of the SU yearbook regarding the insertion of copyright notices and authorship declarations into academic materials, such as dissertations and theses, must be complied with. SU may decide in certain cases to assign ownership of the whole or part of the copyright to the student, or may authorise him or her otherwise to utilise the work commercially or otherwise.