I then asked respondents whether the organization has any written policies regarding the intellectual property assets. Written policies are not necessary for having internally understood standards or expectations of management regarding organizational decisions and processes. However, in this context, written policies were chosen as a way to determine the more thoughtfulness than just awareness of […]

I sent the survey to 107 people at the organizations curated on the theS&I 100 list, which was a list of vetted social entrepreneurs and social enterprises. The point of using this list was to highlight innovators working on social challenges, i.e. social entrepreneurs, since innovation is linked to the creation of intellectual property. I […]

After all of that reading I knew more about intellectual property law and economics, theories of justice and knowledge, and the landscape of innovation. I did not know any more about intellectual property in nonprofit organizations, though. I took the new concepts to the library and did some new searches of the nonprofit literature. Everything […]

Nonprofits were asked if employee of the organization hold the rights to any of the intellectual property in use by the organization. Eighteen (18) respondents replied that no individuals hold rights to the organization’s IP. Though one respondent did not answer this question, all nineteen (19) respondents answered the follow-up question of whether there is […]