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Tim Pickering wrote: For example, who "owns" a student's thesis, the student or his advisor, when it comes to deciding whether to publish on the web? <<<<

Isn't this fairly standard nowdays? In the absence of contractual conditions, Authors generally hold copyright by default, irrespective of the publication medium. So unless the advisor (we would say 'supervisor' in the UK) contributed content, it's the student. Contractual terms could, I suppose, relate to provision of educational services, employment of the student, or award of financial support. The first might be written into general terms of the educational body (ie "student theses are the property of the establishment"), the second is normal in contracts of employment, and the third might be a condition of a grant (eg a Government grant might specify State ownership or, under FIO, no copyright in the US; a company grant might retain IPR). The only argument otherwise might be that the two are co-authors holding joint copyright, perhaps on the grounds that the advisor's intellectual propery (knowledge) was fundamental to the creation, or perhaps included substantial material arising from comments in preparation; there I get lost. Be an interesting argument. Best answer with copyright is to write down the conditions before producing the text! ------------------------------------ Steve Ellison Laboratory of the Government Chemist Queens Road, Teddington, Middlesex ENGLAND TW11 0LY Phone: [ +44 | 0 ]181-943-7325 Fax: [ +44 | 0 ]181-943-2767 chemweb: A list for Chemical Applications of the Internet. To post to list: mailto:chemweb@ic.ac.uk Archived as: http://www.lists.ic.ac.uk/hypermail/chemweb/ To (un)subscribe, mailto:majordomo@ic.ac.uk the following message; (un)subscribe chemweb List coordinator, Henry Rzepa (mailto:rzepa@ic.ac.uk)