Intellectual Property Theft

We've all been there. You go to your advisor with a great idea for your a class you want to design and teach, a research project, even a thesis. Your advisor questions you day in and day out. You "defend" your idea with examples from your rigorous prior literature review, data, and prior experience. Your advisor discourages you from doing your proposed idea, but you keep going, sure of its value. Next thing you know, your advisor announces their own version of your class, research project, or thesis. And you aren't given a single crumb of credit.

"As she looked over the highlighted parts of each paper that indicated similar content, she said that this was the most egregious thing she’d ever seen a professor do to a graduate student." - Allison Harbin

How to Prevent Intellectual Property Theft

Copyright your work.

1. Your work is Copyright protected once it is in fixed form, but you can add the following text as an extra layer of protection.

   1. The copyright symbol © or the word "Copyright"

   2. The year of first publication

   3. The name of the copyright owner

   4. A statement of rights, such as "All Rights Reserved"

2. Consider registering your work with a copyright office or uploading it to an open-access repository that publicly timestamps and proves your authorship.

Keep records of your work. Not just any way. The 'insurance' way.

Using Google Docs to verify your intellectual property is a simple but effective way to protect against plagiarism and establish ownership. Google Docs automatically timestamps every edit and saves version history, creating an immutable record of when a document was created and modified. This built-in audit trail can serve as evidence in cases of plagiarism, proving that you were the original creator of the content. Additionally, storing drafts and revisions in Google Drive ensures your work is backed up and accessible, making it easier to defend your intellectual property in academic or legal disputes.

1. Store your Google Document in an account that is independent of your university email.

Track all meetings regarding your work.

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