Report April 2009

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Status Report, ICP Project

Field Research Methodology

Status

  • Developed first draft of Field Research Methodology
    • Field Research Methodology: The initial draft has evolved to fit the specifics of each specific field.
  • Developed mapping tool and some toy models for fields
    • Foundational data (BGP)
    • Narratives (BGP)
    • Tools (BGP)
    • Textbooks (EM)
  • Developed first draft of Questionnaire for Commons-Based Case Studies
  • A deeper Work on methodology has been put on temporary hold to focus on researching specific fields.
  • After some research, we abandoned the idea of a standard “Questionnaire for Interviews”, and we are developing informal interviews (through email, call conferences and meetings) with experts (scholars and market) from the different fields. We may go back to a quantitative strategy through standard interviews in a second phase of the project, when the descriptive part of each area is more developed.

Next Steps

  • Field Research Methodology: Compare how the questions are being used or are being helpful in each field to make sure the questions are still the same across fields of study. Improve questions language;
  • Mapping Tool: Formalize methodology and develop clearer criteria;
  • Develop a good and uniformed approach to field definition to be used for all vertical fields. This should be enough to present a clean definition of each field and a clean exclusion of issues we will not be focused on;
  • Define types of research deliverables for each field.

Alternative Energy

General Status

  • We have a good idea of the development chain starting with R&D to Development to The AE Plants to Distribution to End Users (Residential, Commercial, Government)
    • A central issue for all of these technologies is cost. This has caused us to consider the government policy and the government role in innovation incentives.
    • Another key issue has been the issue of permits required for product testing. Currently, many agencies are involved in offshore siting (tidal, wind) and the amount of time and money required to test is a barrier to innovation. Universities have begun to place an innovation role by filling the testing void because they are able to bear the costs and they are not concerned about time to market.
  • We divided the research into:
    • Wind - a more mature technology that is less dependent on new innovation and patents, but still has new developments in aerodynamics, and efficiency upgrades to turbines and blades.
      • Wind will be divided into two technology types, onshore and offshore
        • Onshore wind technology is well established, tested, and in-use globally. Innovations are fewer and less monumental in this technology.
        • Offshore wind technology is newer and there are fewer offshore wind farms throughout the world. Innovation in the technology is still happening around developments that will make the turbines more durable in the weather conditions offshore.
    • Solar - less mature technology that can be divided into three types of electricity generating technology
      • Concentrating Solar Power
      • Photovoltaics - Silicon panels
      • Photovoltaics - flat panels
      • Solar has many new patents and innovations which will require in-depth research into the actors, data, narratives, and tools
      • Solar receives a great deal of government R&D funding to drive efficiency upgrades in the technology (efficiency of energy in sun being converted to electricity), and a great deal of government subsidies to drive the development of the market for the technology in the US.
    • Tidal - Very immature technology which is a subset of a larger technology called Ocean Energy
      • Tidal and ocean in general are nascent technologies with very little market penetration. On the other hand, many of these technologies are based on older technologies but they are put to new uses.

Work Completed

Work Remaining

  • Our research remains weak in the following areas:
    • Literature review on efficiencies and barriers caused by IP in AE
    • Data, narratives and tools produced by the AE field
      • Data and Tools need a lot more work, very little in that so far.
      • Narratives have some initial information that will benefit from expansion
    • Define the main legal tools of IP protection available for the field
      • need to work on most aspects of this area.
      • Only info so far is from a few reports
    • Competitive advantages in AE
    • Add under public policies the government funding for resource maps.
    • Use the GE energy case as a study of the incremental innovation and transfer of patents and IP.
    • Buy locally clause in Spanish FIT is important to mention in international models.

Research Methodology in use

  • Literature review
  • Business School Cases review
  • Media review: Area Specific Blogs and News
  • Market databases and reports review
  • Interviews:
    • Eric Lammers - (Principal at ArcLight Capital Partners LLC - Private equity focused in AE) - Interviewed on April 15
    • Prof. Susskind (MIT) - Email sent
    • Prof. Dworkin (Vermont Law) - Email sent
    • Other possible names:
      • Thomas Ackermann
      • Jeremy M. Firestone
      • Peter Mandelstam
      • Walt Musial
      • Ryan Wiser
      • Ed Markey
  • Participation in Events
    • Structuring an Energy Technology Revolution, April 23, Carol and Silas

Problems and Considerations

  • It is difficult to answer: Are there associations in this field/market that are relevant for the IP debate in this field? Identify their policies, recommendations and/or best practices related to IP of their members.
    • Primary materials created by the associations (web sites, white papers, brochures. etc) did not reveal positions on IP protection. Law reviews and other journals have been consulted with similar results
    • This is an area that might best be understood through interviews with association leaders.
  • We recently discussed the need to further incorporate the role of public policy in innovation. Many economic incentives and permitting procedures can be seen playing an important role in the alternative energy markets and regional variations in innovation have developed.
    • This information will soon be incorporated and it should develop quickly given the background research we have for this area.
  • Is wave part of tidal?
    • They are different technologies but they are often grouped. We have some wave technologies defined.
  • Interplay of the renewable energy resource and the technology that converts it to electricity i.e. wind, sun, and tidal regional data and access to this data.
  • Should we do comparative studies of university policies towards openness on data, narratives, and tools?
  • Research and development - product development - power plant development - transmission/conversion - consumption
  • Development Chain
    • The innovation that leads to product development is dependent on transmission and consumption technologies.
      • Which areas should we emphasize?
      • Do we want to investigate the end of the development chain?
  • We are often pushed out of the country in our research. Many of the companies and research collaborations quickly become international.
    • How should we limit out international research?
    • When is it relevant to discuss international materials?
    • One example is GE: GE purchased their intellectual property through acquisition. Is this an interesting model of innovation? Do we want to investigate cross border acquisitions as a form of innovation in the US.

Next Steps

  • Develop methodologies to asses innovation in the field, and if this goes toward closedness or openness:
    • A list of foreign technologies in use by USA companies and the USA efforts to develop national technology. After a first assessment, decide if there are interesting case studies;
    • Find court cases of patent infringement in Alternative energy, and if this is a relevant issue in the field. After a first assessment, decide if there are interesting case studies;
    • Consider the role of public policy as it relates to innovation (ie. economic incentives, permitting required for testing and implementation)
    • Look at the association websites and figure out their motivations.
  • Development Chain (to be added to business models)
    • Research and development - product development - power plant development - transmission/conversion - consumption
  • Knowledge Flow
    • We need to break down the knowledge flow into sciences. We need to talk about the level of innovation/openness for each sub-part. It is likely that we will find that there is variation depending on the definition.

Yochai Feedback

  • Questions to Investigate Further for the Wind industry:
    • Whether there is development that is distributed?
    • Whether the appropriation is through intellectual property?
      • ie. At maturity, there is engineering innovation, and lack of patent dependence
    • How are they licensing the technology (ie GE)
      • We worry big players slowing down innovation with patents
  • Tidal/Wave
    • If they have the same incentives, keep them together
  • Financing
    • Include information about VC culture (does it require patents for funding?)
    • Keep in mind what it is that is motivating and funding innovation
      • Which funding requires openness or enclosure?
  • Our Research Focus: International v. US
    • Use a global map (size and color code should represent where the major players are)
      • We want to get this global open/closed model
      • He wants to use Carolina's idea of comparative chart. The recent national announcements make this relevant
  • Energy Policy
    • Policy on institutional interventions are the most interesting findings
      • Feed-in tariff v. renewable portfolio standards policy is significant
      • Regulation of siting can be a significant barrier. This is a useful distinction to include.
  • Framing our Research (The Big Picture)
    • It is important to consider the political position of the company separate of the actual ip position (IBM: biggest holder of patents but open policy)
    • How are market interventions justified (ie are there constraints?)
    • Consider if policies are enclosure devices
    • Consider the feasibility of a commons based strategy (what shows us the feasibility?)
    • Confirmatory evidence and negative evidence are both important
  • Visualizing Research Results
    • Inventory market players (include market shares and sales)
    • Use a conceptual 2-d map to show where companies stand
    • Use color coding or other means of visually representing the kinds of appropriation and funding strategy an entity uses
      • patents, gov funding, etc.
      • market, government, non-profit, etc.

Biotechnology, Genomics, and Proteomics

General Status

  • Good progress in completing our general study of the field - by now we are able to give an anecdotal picture of the field, including an idea of what are the stable markets and what are the evolving markets. We have developed an extensive bibliography, and have offered initial answers to most of the field research questions. However, big holes remain in some of the most important areas related to actors that are developing strategies around openness, and some answers remain cursory. Our objective now is to fill in the details, provide specific examples to justify our claims, be sure we are covering the literature we need to review;
  • The division of the industry into data; narratives and tools proved very useful and ideal to this field;
  • Toy mapping models were developed in Foundational Data, Narratives and Tools (We need to do more investigation on observational data in the field);
  • The idea for two papers, which would accompanied the first phase report, were developed: “Sage - A Merck Project” - focused on the historical of data-sharing strategies - and “A brief history of license practices in BGP - the case of PCR” - focused on licensing strategies on a breakthrough technology. However, just the former will be developed this time in co-authorship with John Wilbanks, from Science commons and part of the Sage Board.

Work Completed

Work Remaining

Research Methodology in use:

  • Literature review
  • Business School Cases review
  • Media review: Area Specific Blogs and News
  • Market databases and corporate reports review
  • Interviews
    • John Wilbanks (SC) - Interviewed in April
    • Fiona Murray (MIT) - Meeting scheduled for May, 7th
    • Hal Abelson - MIT Professor. Board of Science Commons and ccLearn
    • Becky Ward - Executive Director of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School
    • Ed Penhoet - Co-founder Chiron Corporation
    • Regis B. Kelly - Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, University of California ad Executive Director of QB3
    • Lee Flemming - Professor, HBS
  • Participation in Events
    • Open Innovation Workshop at MIT in May - Yochai and Carol

Problems and Considerations

  • In answering questions related to Commons-based, peer-production, and open business models in BGP, there simply is not a lot of publicly available content online. To find out whether and how BGP actors are engaging in open models we will develop a series of interviews. For that, we will start to work in a list of potential interviewees.
  • How specific should we get in the history of the field?
  • Who collaborates more? big companies or start-ups?
  • How much do companies encourage publishing?
  • We need to define batter the basic concepts of the field, e.g., what is a tool? What is foundational data?

Next Steps

  • Keep literature review;
  • develop Interviews strategy for information we could not find in secondary sources

Yochai Feedback

  • Focus on map of the field
  • Skim cases/subjects that are not well-researched for particularly interesting items
  • Two maps: one for political players and one for production players
    • Associations and nonprofits can be important too; we may need to create a new map that will predict political alignment around IP approaches
  • Questions for Exploration:
    • Compare maps (e.g. analysis: largest patent holder might be lean politically toward OA like IBM); why?
    • VCs may not require patent for internet company startups but may for Biotech startups; why?
    • Is publishing an act of information sharing?
      • Interviewing subjects in this field: "you will probably find..." people with mixed motivations--want to have their name in big journals (company strategy for attracting the best scientists?)

Educational Materials

General Status

  • We have identified access dynamics as the central question of this field versus innovation dynamics
    • This is differentiated between the K-12 markets and the Higher Education market
    • We will analyze the access dynamics by charting the IP and economics issues of the different markets against the main outputs of textbooks and complementary materials
  • Satisfactory progress has been made in terms of general study of the EM field regarding Higher Education market
    • We have an anecdotal mapping of actors and outputs in Higher Ed, which is a highly consolidate market where 6 publishers produce 85% of the output
    • We have reviewed a significant body of state legislation looking at textbook costs
  • For the K-12 market, we understand some of the dynamics of statewide, school district textbook purchasing, but market is more disperse and harder to analyze
  • An extensive bibliography has been compiled and grows daily, but holes exist with regard to non-profit publishers and the costs of production of EM like writing a textbook then manufacturing the physical book, as well as for the K-12 market more generally
  • Good contacts have been, and continue to be made, with academics and actors in the field

Work Completed

Work Remaining

Research Methodology in use

  • Literature review
  • Business School Cases review
  • Media review: Area Specific Blogs and News
  • Market databases and reports review
  • Interviews
    • Nicole Allen, Make Textbooks Affordable - Feb, 2009
    • Diane Harley, Ph.D., Director, Higher Education in the Digital Age Project, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley - Feb, 2009
    • Jonathan Emmons, Community Development Specialist Connexions (http://cnx.org) - Mar,2009
    • Joel Thierstein, Executive Director Connexions - Email sent
    • Anita Elberse, HBS Professor studying 'creative industries' - will contact this week

Problems and Considerations

  • Some of the content, relevant to the weaker areas listed above, needs to be eventually disaggregated and re-contextualized from the Overall Picture of the EM field area
  • Our outputs framework of data, narratives, and tools is challenging to differentiate and map onto Educational Materials, which are almost universally narrative
    • Any data that has been compiled for educational use is generally packaged in a format for use in well-defined activities
    • Tools such as multimedia educational software are still essentially narrative products in terms of content
  • IP in EM: the largely narrative nature of educational materials restricts the IP regulation analysis to copyright and fair use
  • In contrast to IP in EM, the economics (and politics) of the field can be very complex due to the range of interested and influential parties advocating for and regulating policies on textbooks at all levels of education
  • Questions about focus of research:
    • Should we break down the fundamental costs of bringing a textbook to press?
    • (Instead) Are we more interested in access as an IP and economic issue?
    • Technology is changing the industry (eBooks, etc.); should we look at it from an "access" perspective or a change in the "production line" perspective? (Both?)
    • Do we want to look at how managerial styles influence closedness and openness?
    • Do we need to understand the cost structure of producing OER?
      • Specifically, do we want to then compare the structure and price of OER versus traditional publishing to see how these relate to incentives, market economics, and effects on access
    • Thereby, do we also need to understand the motivations of OER production, different for our proposed cases of MIT OpenCourseWare and Connexions?
  • The study of this particular industry was slightly delayed due to HR difficulties through February

Next Steps

  • Keep literature review
    • Continue to consolidate various links and sources into main wiki
  • Develop Interviewing strategy for information we could not find in secondary sources
  • Plan to explore law suits between publishers and universities over production of custom coursepacks form copyrighted content (see Cornell case/settlement)
    • We want to understand the dynamics and pressures that are leading to this issue, and how it’s related to a our access question more generally
  • Ask Yochai about going deeper on the motivations and legislative history, following up on Sen. Bill Foster’s proposed 2009 Open Source Textbooks legislation.
  • Re-double efforts now that the research assistant's other part-time job is ending
  • Produce publishable report on EM field in June

Yochai Feedback

  • Focus of Research
    • Look at special interests
    • We’re not looking for forces towards enclosure we are looking at what strategies there are to producing open resources
      • Narrative background of textbooks: course-packets are an ad-hoc textbook
  • Economics of EM Industry
    • Assuming users pay little, what is the business model that allows you to produce while charging little?
    • Identify are the central aspects of a production system that produces outputs that are not proprietary?
    • We need comparative cost breakdown of production (traditional versus digital/OA/etc.)
    • Can we compare and explain eBook and physical book price differences?
      • If eBook production is generating new companies and distinct market / production system then this is valuable (e.g. Lulu?)
      • Otherwise, if it’s like Amazon Kindle then this topic merits about a page
  • Impact of States (like Texas)
    • If Texas, California act as oligopolies in buying textbooks then they are major players too (see Steve Briar, 1970 on concentrated buying power)
      • Worth mapping like associations (as clouds), influencing cost and structure of the industry
    • Related Question: How much do publishers rely on other types of sales (not just state schools)?
  • Complementary materials include online games, multimedia activities online, lab simulation software, etc.
  • Educational appropriation of commons items merit a page (i.e. Flickr photos, YouTube videos)
    • Include a suggestion that this might be the future solution
  • Doing Interviews and Surveys:
    • Interview people who are developing open source learning materials: look at Utah State and Hewlett Foundation fundees
    • Develop survey to send to K-12
      • Use SurveyMonkey to survey school principals and educational tech people to report on what people are using
      • Ask: Do states who purchase textbooks collectively also collectively acquire learning objects?
    • Contact Harvard Ed School people
    • Interview Andreas Munro, PhD student at MIT, creator of Scratch
  • Cases
    • Connexions Int'l Open Ed Partnerships--case worth describing!
    • Question: How long since Wikitexts? If still not working then there is a deep structural problem in peer production of textbooks and we need to ask why?
  • Look at legislation to know political players and how they are aligned
    • See amicus briefs from Grokster case (who is pro-enclosure, counter-intuitive?)
    • Compile legislative history surrounding policies and lobbyists on court cases (e.g. trace Sen. Foster's new Bill)

Telecommunication

General Status

  • Good progress in completing our general study of the field. Expect to have a first draft of 5-10 page overview narrative, with tables and figures, in the next couple weeks
  • Need to assemble more systematic bibliography and better document sources for this narrative
  • Have initial case study candidates, with principle sources identified for a subset of those.
  • Need to post identified case sources to wiki

Work Completed

  • We have fairly extensive research in the following areas:
    • Overview of Economics of Intellectual Property in Telecom
    • Overall picture of the Telecom field
    • Outputs and Products of the Field (in the BGP taxonomy, tools + an additional category, services)
    • Profile of Biggest for-profit companies in Telecom (which seem by the far the most important actrs, other than associations, which are really just aggregations of the for profits)
    • Profile of non-profit companies in Telecom (none that I have found)
    • Legal tools available for and in use by the actors in Telecom (patents, with various licensing strategies)
    • Competitive advantages in Telecom (though more so for operators than for vendors)
    • Initial identification of interesting cases

Work Remaining

  • Our research remains weaker in the following areas:
    • Deeper Understanding of Associations and Standard Setting Arrangments in Telecom
    • University and Other Public Sector (incl. military) Role
    • Deep Dive into Specific Cases

Research Methodology in use

  • Literature review
  • Business School Cases review
  • Media review: Area Specific Blogs and News
  • Market databases and reports review
  • Interviews
  • Participation in Events

Problems and Considerations

  • Need to make sure work is fully documented and in a condition to hand off easily starting in a couple weeks, and remains in that condition

Next Steps

  • Draft field overview narrative
  • Post better bibliographies
  • Fill in research gaps, perhaps including a few focused interviews
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