Patents and Intellectual Property in Entrepreneurship Education in ...

Session F2D

Patents and Intellectual Property in Entrepreneurship Education in Computing at Hofstra University Gerda L. Kamberova, Andrea Pacelli, John Impagliazzo, Edward H. Currie, Simona Doboli Hofstra University, [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] King & Spalding LLP, [email protected] and [email protected] Abstract - Entrepreneurship is an integral part of the computing education at Hofstra University and consists of: (i) two optional, specialization-type programs as part of undergraduate degrees that target students with strong entrepreneurial interests, and (ii) open seminars and enrichment modules, exposing all majors to entrepreneurial ideas and activities while attempting to spark their creativity and drive for innovation. To educate students and help them understand the purpose, procedures, cost and legal implications of patenting and intellectual property issues and to give them first-hand experience in these subjects, we have included “patents and intellectual property” as one of the facets of the new programs and activities. In this paper, we present the implementation details and we summarize the experiences and practices and draw conclusions. Adoption of modules at Qatar University illustrates the generality and transferability of the approach. Index Terms – Computing education, Patents and intellectual property, Entrepreneurship INTRODUCTION

legal issues governing the patenting of software-related inventions are relatively new (since the 1980s) [1] and still under development [2]. Entrepreneurship is an integral part of the computing education at Hofstra University. At the Department of Computer Science, we introduced two optional programs in entrepreneurship education that are part of the undergraduate degree requirements in computer science and computer engineering. These programs target those majors who have especially strong business and entrepreneurial interests, and constitute the “depth” component of the entrepreneurship curriculum. We also developed a “breadth” component, consisting of out-of-class seminars and of entrepreneurship modules integrated within standard undergraduate courses in computer science, thus exposing all majors to entrepreneurial ideas and activities, and attempting to spark the student creativity and drive for innovation. These programs have been developed and implemented at Hofstra University, USA, with modules implemented and tested at Qatar University, Qatar. To help students understand the purpose, procedures, cost and legal implications of patenting and related issues (e.g., licensing, infringement, trademark, copyright) and to give them some first-hand experience in these subjects, we have included “Patents and Intellectual Property” (PIP) in the breadth component of our “Entrepreneurship in Computing” programs. PIP modules and experiences occur in the required course “Computing, Ethics and Society” and in the elective courses “Computer Graphics” and “Leadership and Innovation in Computing” (the latter course is also part of the depth component, as explained later). Entrepreneurs and patent lawyers present extra-curricular seminars though the academic year. Our objective is to produce graduates capable of making judgments about the value and quality of patents, their costs and potential returns, and any associated pitfalls. These graduates should able to answer the question: “To patent, or not?” for themselves. We now summarize the entrepreneurship programs at Hofstra and comment upon the patent and intellectual property related curriculum and activities. We also illustrate the approach as used at Qatar University.

Entrepreneurship and cutting-edge science and engineering are defining attributes of the United States economy, which is still one of the premier destinations for international students of higher education. Yet, we recognize that in the not-so-distant future, countries such as China, Brazil, and India may come to dominate global markets. To ensure that the United States retains a competitive edge in higher education and industry, entrepreneurship has recently reemerged as a focus of academic and professional development programs in the private and public sectors. If entrepreneurship is the road to innovation, patents are an instrument to stimulate innovation by rewarding inventors, thus serving as an incentive for more inventions. A patent is a monopoly granted to an inventor by the United States government. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office performs a technical and legal examination of hundreds of thousands of patent applications every year, and eventually grants legal protection to those inventions deemed worthy of a patent. To be patentable, an invention must be new, useful, non-obvious, and adequately disclosed; it must also be within the scope of patentable subject matter. The rules and 978-1-61284-469-5/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE October 12 - 15, 2011, Rapid City, SD 41st ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference F2D-1

Session F2D BACKGROUND AND CONTRIBUTIONS OVERVIEW I. Patents in Computing Here we present needed background. This background is an essential foundation on which and around which our curriculum is built. An entrepreneur in the computing fields should have a basic understanding of the policies of intellectual property, of the legal requirements for protection (both substantive and procedural), and of the main roadblocks one may encounter. The entrepreneur should be able to perform a cost-benefit analysis of the various options for protecting one’s intellectual property. The United States patent system is essentially a legal construct that allows technology entrepreneurs to reap the fruit of their labor. The United States Constitution gives Congress the power to “promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts,” by granting “for Limited Times” an exclusive right to inventors to practice their innovations. Thus, someone who invents something worthy of a patent has approximately twenty years to exploit his or her invention on the marketplace, safe from copying. The United States Patent and Trademark Office stands at the threshold of the patent system, with the intent of separating true innovations from trivial improvements and variations. Each year, the Office receives approximately 300,000 new applications for utility patents. Patent examiners must analyze each of these applications to make sure they meet many requirements, some of which may be roughly summarized as follows: 1. Novelty: what is claimed as an invention is not in fact found in the “prior art,” i.e., the public technical knowledge (e.g., publications and patents) that predates the invention. 2. Non-obviousness: the inventor claims a true invention and not a trivial improvement on the prior art. The courts have developed sophisticated, but not quite easy-to-apply, tests to distinguish obvious from nonobvious inventions. 3. Enablement: the patent provides sufficient technical details to allow the public to practice the invention. This forces inventors to contribute to the public knowledge in return for the legal rights. 4. Written description: the patent shows that the inventors were in possession of the invention at the time of filing of the patent application. This requirement essentially freezes the scope of a patent as disclosed at the time of filing; it prevents inventors from expanding their legal rights using knowledge acquired after the filing. 5. Patentable subject matter: the patent law allows the granting of rights on “any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof.” However, one cannot obtain a patent on a natural phenomenon, a law of nature, or an abstract idea. For a long time, many types of inventions relating to computing were not patentable. For example, courts have analogized mathematical algorithms to laws of nature or abstract ideas, and denied patents on such algorithms. Starting in the early 1980s, a few landmark court decisions signaled an expansion of the boundaries of patentability, but also the beginning of a period of instability, with each new

decision moving those boundaries. During the last thirty years, various criteria for patentability were created and later overruled; however, the law is still far from being settled [2]. For a variety of reasons, people argued that patents are a poor fit for the computing field, and specifically the software industry [3]. First, patents may be relatively ineffective in promoting software inventions, where existing competition between companies is more than sufficient to spur innovation. Second, product life cycle is so fast that by the time one obtains a patent, that technology may no longer be in use. Third, the twenty-year term of protection may be too long for such a fast-moving industry, with long periods of monopoly actually stifling innovation. Another problem with computing-related patents is that some of the knowledge in this field is not easily accessible, for example, as in established fields such as the pharmaceutical or chemical industries; many software innovations only exist as actual program code and in the minds of their inventors, but not as patents or journal publications [3-5]. Patent examiners are typically limited to such public sources in their searches for prior art. Therefore, they may find it difficult to reject patent applications on inventions that are not new and not well documented in the literature. This has led many to complain about the excessive issuance of patents of questionable validity [3, 5]. A final problem with the state of the patent system is that patents bring benefits, but also substantial costs. A patent is a legal monopoly, and monopoly economies are notoriously inefficient. For example, a patent owner can charge a royalty from anyone who uses her invention, and that royalty typically passes on to consumers. Once the inventor has recouped her R&D costs, the royalty may become what economists call a “dead weight loss,” a transfer of money that brings no benefit to the economy at large, and indeed creates a barrier to beneficial exploitation of the invention. In addition, a patent owner can deliberately refuse to license her invention, and keep new business out of a market. This in turn stifles competition and ultimately harms consumers. Finally, the cost of running a system to examine and enforce patents runs in the billions of dollars yearly, with the median cost of a single, relatively small patent infringement lawsuit at $2.5 million as of 2009 [4, 6]. The substantial costs of patenting to companies and to the economy require a careful consideration of the many alternatives. An innovator wishing to protect a new technology has a variety of options, which include trade secret, copyright and even trademark protection. Even in the absence of legal protection, a business may succeed in the marketplace simply by constantly improving its offerings over the competition. Each of these options should be part of the educated entrepreneur’s intellectual property strategy and related considerations. II. Patents and Intellectual Property in Computer Science Education Combining engineering and entrepreneurship, patenting inventions, and transfer of technology from academia to

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Session F2D industry are features of many strong engineering departments (Stevens Institute of Technology, Columbia University, The State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stanford University, and University of California at Berkeley, to name a few) [7]. The importance of introducing undergraduate engineering students to Patents and Intellectual Property (PIP) in recognized [8]. Most of software engineering and computer science undergraduate curriculum is dedicated to the design and analysis of algorithms for solving problems with computers, to the development and implementation of computer programs and software systems, and of data structures and methods for storing and manipulating digital data. Computer science graduates find jobs in established software companies or end up working for themselves. Most computing graduates create or maintain computer programs or software systems. Software has some similarity with engineering products, but at the same time with art objects and abstract creations. There are specific issues and subtleties related to PIP as applied to software. Moreover, the laws are not settled but changing [2]. Yet, most computing undergraduates are not aware of the P IP and related issues and are unfamiliar with the legal terms and language. Our approach in introducing undergraduate students to these ideas has some similarity to [8]. In [8], the authors discuss the introduction of legal topics in the computer science curriculum through a twoweek series of lectures, videos, case studies, discussions and tutorials, all during the first year. Rather than adopting such crush-course two-week model, we align better with the proposal discussed in [8], where the legal topics are to be introduced over three years, partially integrated in two existing undergraduate courses and in a new dedicated course. A distinguishing feature of our model is the unified approach where PIP are discussed, implemented and tested in the entrepreneurship part of the computing curriculum. III. Contributions Patents and Intellectual Property (PIP) are integral part of the computing education: through multiple (transferable) modules, part of the breadth component of the Entrepreneurship program, and through inclusion in a dedicated course, part of the depth component he program. We have introduced depth and breadth entrepreneurship components in the computing education at Hofstra. The breadth component is an integral part of the computer science and computer engineering education. Modules on entrepreneurship weave through a sequence of required and elective courses and through regular seminars. All majors in the department are exposed to entrepreneurship ideas, practices and related business terminology/activities. PIP are part of the breadth curriculum and activities. Our main focus in this paper is PIP treatment in the modules in multiple undergraduate courses in Computer Science. Some of the courses are standard undergraduate courses, such as Algorithm Design and Analysis. Computer Graphics, and Computing Ethics. The course "Leadership and Innovation in Computing", is a new elective intense course for

computing majors focusing on business and entrepreneurial aspects in the computing industry. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first course of its kind that is specifically for computer science undergraduate students and encompasses all aspects of entrepreneurial ventures in computing, culminating in a business plan competition. The other three courses, in which PIP modules are integrated, except for the modules themselves follow the standard undergraduate computer science curriculum. All modules that were developed earlier (excluding the PIP modules) have been presented in [9]. The modules, account for are the difference between our courses and similar courses at other universities. In this paper, we discuss the PIP aspects of the modules which were not discussed in [9]. The course "Leadership and Innovation in Computing" serves both the breadth component (as discussed in the next section). The decision to discuss the topics for the Ethics course in its Qatar version is in order to illustrate the generality and the transferability of the approach. The depth component is optional and designed for students with strong entrepreneurial inclinations. The breadth component introduces entrepreneurship to all students while the depth component allows them to develop their interest in entrepreneurship and gain stronger foundations and practical experience. The overall objectives of this holistic approach are to: 1. Produce well rounded computing undergraduates with excellent communication skills and understanding of the business world; 2. Integrate entrepreneurial and leadership skills into the computer science and computer engineering curricula; 3. Engage computing and business students and faculty members in interdisciplinary entrepreneurial activities; and 4. Encourage collaboration with global engineers and scientists in the areas of computing and information technology. The outcomes provide an increased awareness by the computing student and faculty of entrepreneurial skills, an integration of the entrepreneurship activities in the computing education, promotion of innovation and discovery in the computing field, encouragement of minority and women computing students to become entrepreneurs, and an increase in local collaboration between universities and industry. IMPLEMENTATION AND PRACTICES I. Entrepreneurship Education Breadth Component

We now summarize the features of the breadth modules, detailed in [9]. Students exposed to the breadth component of the project are expected to attain increased awareness to innovation and creativity in high-technology computing areas, enhance the view of the computing field as an area having a global impact on all aspects of society, and enhance students’ ability to identify market needs and entrepreneurial opportunities in computing. Additionally, they should communicate effectively to a diverse audience in written, oral, and multimedia format, organize and manage a project and work effectively on a team to complete a project. 978-1-61284-469-5/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE October 12 - 15, 2011, Rapid City, SD 41st ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference F2D-3

Session F2D The constraints under which the modules are developed are to add-on and enrich the courses, without squeezing out topics from the traditional curriculum, thus ideally the entrepreneurship topics are weaved in the technical content through class discussions and additional requirements on assignments and projects (as appropriate). Initially, we designed all modules of the breadth components to have a general introduction to entrepreneurship, later we realized that this was redundant and we dropped it from upper level courses. Another facet of the modules relates entrepreneurship to the technical content of the courses, and a third facet is practical experience through an assignment or a project. The modules are integrated in following courses: “Data Structures and Algorithms” (required, freshman), “Introduction to Computer Architecture” (required, sophomore), “Design and Analysis of Algorithms” (junior, required), “Computer Graphics” (elective, junior/senior), “Computing, Ethics and Society” (required, sophomore/junior), and “Software Engineering” (required, senior). We have already developed and implemented five modules to date. II. The Entrepreneurship Education Depth Component The depth component consists of two programs that students could complete as part of the graduation requirements: Concentration in Leadership and Innovation in Computing (CLIC) and Option in Leadership and Innovation in Computing (OLIC). Students exposed to the depth component (CLIC) are expected to possess the outcomes outlined in the breadth component (OLIC) and presented in the next sub-section. In addition, they should be able to identify innovative, entrepreneurship opportunities in high-tech computing areas, work effectively in a multidisciplinary global team, develop a business plan appropriate for a technology venture, conduct patent searches, write a patent disclosure for novel work, and present effectively their ideas and business plan to potential investors. Additionally, they should understand the process of obtaining financing for a new venture, understand the roles of core business divisions such as marketing, operations, and human resources, integrate technology development with commercialization, and understand and appreciate various cultural differences in the global market. CLIC targets students who are interested in pursuing innovations in the computing field that can have an impact on society, who want to bridge their technical degree with business, and who are motivated to increase further their knowledge of the entrepreneurship and business functions of the computing industry. Students will be taught to identify and pursue innovative entrepreneurship opportunities in high-tech computing areas, to understand the computing business environment and the roles of core business divisions to integrate entrepreneurial and computing skills, and to work effectively in globally distributed teams. The students in the concentration obtain an 18-credit minor entrepreneurship minor by completing business courses in principles of marketing, financial accounting, new business

ventures and entrepreneurship, and by completing an internship and a two-semester senior design project coupled with a senior seminar. Like the concentration, the OLIC option targets students who are interested in pursuing innovations in the computing field that can have an impact on society. Through an intensive, nine-semester-hour program, students in the option will be taught to identify and pursue innovative entrepreneurship opportunities in high-tech computing areas, to develop basic skills needed to start their own company or to work for a start-up company, and to work effectively in globally distributed teams. The option does not include the business courses that are part of the concentration; instead, students take one three-credit computer science course “Leadership and Innovation in Computing”—an intensive course on everything a computing major needs to know about entrepreneurship in the high-tech industry. The course is required for students choosing the OLIC option; it is also an elective for all majors in computer science and computer engineering, thus serves both the depth and the breadth components. It introduces students to the foundations of leadership and innovation in high-technology areas. Working with leaders and entrepreneurs in the computing field, students gain hands-on experience in identifying opportunities for innovation and product development, and with the life cycle of new high-tech ventures (from ideas to implementation). The course complements students’ knowledge and skills in the computer field with a perspective on leadership and innovation, including PIP. III. Patents and Intellectual Property (PIP) in the Computing Education We introduce and discuss PIP integrated in four different courses (all part of the breadth component, with one of the courses part of both components) and the PIP seminars. The course are “Computing, Ethics and Society” (required), “Design and Analysis of Algorithms” (required), “Computer Graphics” (elective) and “Leadership and Innovation in Computing” (elective for all majors, required for CLIC and OLIC). We have already taught three of the courses, the fourth will be taught in fall 2011 semester. In addition, the ethics course has been taught at Qatar University. The reader is referred to [9] for general details on the modules. Here, we give details on PIP related features of the modules. PIP in the Leadership and Innovation Course: Students are required to engage in online patent searches to determine if the products described in their business plans are patentable or infringing. Students file mock provisional patent applications, maintain special notebooks with numbered pages and sewn in signatures, countersigned by another student from time to time to record the date and time of the student’s development of potentially patentable ideas. Students study various forms of nondisclosure agreements and engage in role-playing in which they present their products, software or intellectual property to fictitious companies that may have an interest in either acquiring or licensing them. Students receive sample patents and they


Session F2D learn basic patent structure, terminology, and claim structuring. They explore the pros and cons of patents in some detail and discuss in detail alternative protection techniques. Patent attorneys who discuss trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, patent fundamentals, patent appeal processes, and patent enforcement present seminars to the students. PIP in the Computer Graphics Course: Students are introduced to patents and intellectual property issues through an assigned required reading [10] at the beginning of the course. The notions of patents and copyrights are introduced and differentiated, and are contrasted with trade secrets. Issues such as eligibility, procedures for obtaining a patent or copyright, use, infringement and changes in the law are discussed, specifically as pertaining to software and algorithms, pros and cons for software patenting are discussed. During the course of the semester, student report on current issues specifically in the context of computer graphics hardware or software (for example Rambus Inc., filing a patent-infringement complaint against NVIDIA Corp, Dec 1, 2010; NVIDIA 3D TV; NVIDIA’s patent for “an invention that makes the pixel processing pipeline faster and more efficient”, US Patent 7609272). There were three times during the semester for student presentations, these where scheduled in advance and there was no specific restriction on the nature of the invention/patent. In the future, we plan to make the patent search/presentation part of every new curriculum topic. Thus, integrated seamlessly the patent and intellectual property student research into the curriculum and truly creating an integrated approach. Another objective of the computer graphics breadth module was to enable students to interact with computing professionals outside of school. The class took a fieldtrip, attending a professional meeting of The Association of Information Technology Professionals (AITP), “Digital media, Content and Innovation”. Later, students did research on upcoming 3D technologies and did class presentations. The students in the class formed the core of the student chapter of the AITP at Hofstra. This was a senior level class and the AITP fieldtrip was very appropriate, allowing students to network directly with potential employers. Specifically, to obtain practical experience as part of the final activities for the course, students had to do (1) a patent search related to computer graphics and present it in class, and (2) prepare a mock patent based on their final projects in the class. Most of the students opt to do a mock patent on a virtual camera interface, a texture mapping approach, or “cool effects”, for example, of “exploding spheres”. Table 1 presents the PIP related work and activities. PIP in the Computing Ethics Course: The course, including the breadth component, was developed as part of the computing curriculum at Hofstra University, and it was transplanted to Qatar University. To illustrate the generality of our approach and the adaptability of the modules and dissemination, we discuss the Qatar University implementation. Entrepreneurship, creativity, and intellectual property rights are constant themes in the

computer ethics course [9]. Students contrast utilitarian and Kantian philosophical viewpoints. For example, is it right (ethically, morally, and legally) to distribute pirated software to people living in remote areas of the world who earn little or no income? Such discussions often triggered utilitarian and Kantian controversies. Intellectual property rights are an important element in the governance of Qatar. Until the mid-1990s, Qatar was a haven for intellectual piracy; copying and selling other people’s works at a profit was the norm. Even when the police attempted to catch the pirates, the government had no law and as a result, it could not apply penalties [11, 12]. In 1995, however, Qatar issued the long-awaited Law No. 25 of 1995 concerning protection of intellectual property and copyrights [13]. The law protects original literary and artistic works, including computer software, video, and audio tapes. The law included penalties for violation including fines and/or imprisonment. In 2002, the Qatar Law No. 7 covered all the materials that were missing in the previous law and imposed new penalties of fines and imprisonment; this law is in effect today [13]. The law protects people with entrepreneurial creativity. It also mentions the rights to communicate original work and about publishing it. It even protects national folklore and oral expressions such as tales and poetry. Authors receive protection under this law for original literary and artistic works, irrespective of their value or mode of expression. The instructor usually presents a scenario on an exam or in class to underscore the importance of understanding intellectual property and the rights attributed to authors of creative and entrepreneurial works. The following is a sample scenario to highlight the law of 2002. Scenario: Fatima and her brother Khaled are twins and they live in Doha. On their twenty-first birthday, their parents prepare for them a special dinner with close family and friends. Their parents bring out a large birthday cake and everyone sings: Happy Birthday to You… The next afternoon, Fatima and Khaled continue their celebration by inviting their friends to a restaurant. All is festive and toward the end of the celebration, the restaurant owner brings out a nice cake and everyone sings again, Happy Birthday to You… Friends are taking pictures and recording movies of the celebration as Fatima and Khaled sing the birthday jingle to each other. That evening, Fatima and Khaled go home and upload the digital photos and the video recording of their celebration on YouTube. A few days later the police stop the twins, place them under arrest, and send them to jail. The police official notifies their parents, who hire a barrister (lawyer) to help. The barrister speaks. The state is accusing Fatima and Khaled of violating the laws of Qatar, specifically Law No. 7 of 2002. It seems they used copyrighted material without permission of the owner. You might know that Mildred J. Hill composed the birthday melody “Happy Birthday” in 1893. Mildred Hill died in 1916 but her sister was able to secure the copyright in 1934. This copyright is still in force; under the current law, the tune will not enter the public


Session F2D domain until 2030. The royalty payments going to the family of this song is about $2 million US dollars per year, which exacerbates the problem. Therefore, Fatima and Khaled could face up to one-year imprisonment and severe monetary fines. The judge should be considering this case in a month or so. Discussion Questions: What do you think about all this? Did Fatima and Khaled violate the laws of Qatar? Are they criminals? How would you contrast (legally, ethically, and professionally) singing the birthday jingle at home, at the restaurant, and the world viewing it on YouTube? How would you argue (legally, ethically, and professionally) from the position of the government attesting that Fatima and Khaled are evil and criminals and that the state should imprison them for a year? How would you argue (legally, ethically, and professionally) in the defense of Fatima and Khaled so a judge would not confine them to jail? ■ Clearly, this scenario could generate much argument and controversy. It is important to understand that students and the public should respect the rights of others, whether they are artists or entrepreneurs. The above scenario and the discussion questions attempt to “hit home” this notion. In particular, these students would want the world to respect their creative works with the same protection given to those who came before them. PIP in Out-of-class Seminars: Andrea Pacelli, PhD, JD, presented a series of three seminars on “Patent, Copyright and Trademark Protection”. He discussed the overlap between patent, copyright and trademark protection. He stressed that despite their different origins and policies, different types of intellectual property are often used simultaneously. Sometimes, they could work together to benefit not only their owner, but also the economy at large. In other cases, they could be used to lock competitors out of a market. The seminars were very well attended and students demonstrated high level of interest and engagement. TABLE I SAMPLE ACTIVITIES: PATENT AND INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY (PIP) ACTIVITIES IN COMPUTER GRAPHICS (CG) CLASS Week Subject Type of Activity 1 Introduction to Patents and IP Reading 3 Current CG/PIP events Online research, in class presentations 5 AITP Networking Event Field trip 6 Current CG/PIP events Online research, in class presentations 11-12 Final CG Patent Research Online research 13 Final Mock Patent Filing Written report 14 Final Defense Student Presentations

CONCLUSIONS

ACKNOWLEDGMENT This work is partially supported by collaborative NSF CPATH grant CNS-0829641: Collaborative Research: CPATH TI: Project EXCE2L (Excellence in Computer Education with Entrepreneurship and Leadership Skills) to Hofstra University. We thank Xiang Fu, Hofstra University, for the useful discussions and suggestions. REFERENCES [1] Samuelson, Pamela, “Intellectual Property for an Information Age”, Communications of the ACM, Vol. 44 No 2, February 2001, pp.67–68. [2] Federal Trade Commission, The Evolving IP Marketplace: Aligning Patent Notice and Remedies with Competition, March 2011, http://www.ftc.gov/os/2011/03/110307patentreport.pdf. [3] Federal Trade Commission, To Promote Innovation: The Proper Balance of Competition and Patent Law and Policy, Chapter V, Oct. 2003, http://www.ftc.gov/os/2003/10/innovationrpt.pdf. [4] Lemley, Mark A., “Rational Ignorance at the Patent Office,” Northwestern University Law Review, Vol. 95, No. 4, 2001. [5] Lemley, Mark A. and Cohen, Julie E., “Patent Scope and Innovation in the Software Industry,” California Law Review, Vol. 89, No. 1, 2001. [6] American Intellectual Property Law Association, AIPLA Report of the Economic Survey, 2009. [7] Kenney, Martin, Goe, W. Richard, “The role of social embeddedness in professorial entrepreneurship: a comparison of electrical engineering and computer science at UC Berkeley and Stanford”, Research Policy, Vol. 33, 2004, pp. 691–707. [8] Cifuentes, Christina, Fitzgerald, Anne, “Introducing a Legal Strand in the Computer Science Curriculum”, ACSE '98 Proceedings of the 3rd Australasian conference on Computer science education, ACM New York, NY, USA ©1998, ISBN: 1-58113-018-X [9] Doboli, Simona, Kamberova, Gerda, Impagliazzo, John, Fu, Xiang, Currie, Edward, “A Model of Entrepreneurship Education for Computer Science and Computer Engineering Students”, Proc IEEE Frontiers of Education Conference (FIE 2010), 2010, IEEE Xplore ISBN: 978-14244-6259-9. [10 ] Bowyer, Kevin W., (Ed.), “Intellectual-Property Issues”, Ethics and Computing: Living Responsibility in a Computerized World, Second Edition, IEEE Press, 2001. ISBN: 0780360192, pp. 261-277. [11] http://www.iipa.com/rbc/2002/2002SPEC301QATAR.pdf [12] http://www1.american.edu/carmel/SR3362A/LEGAL.HTML [13] ttp://www.mbt.gov.qa/English/ForeignInvestor/Documents/rule_7e.pdf

AUTHOR INFORMATION Gerda Kamberova, Professor, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, [email protected] Andrea Pacelli, PhD, JD, King & Spalding LLP, New York, NY, [email protected] John Impagliazzo, Emeritus Professor, Hofstra University, Former Professor and endowed Chair at Qatar University, Qatar, [email protected] Edward Currie, Adjunct Professor, Hofstra Hempstead, NY, [email protected]

University,

Simona

University,

Doboli,

Associate

Professor,

Hofstra

The students very well received the PIP topics introduced Hempstead, NY, [email protected] through the curriculum and in seminars. They appreciated the variety of activities and experiences, including the hands on projects, fieldtrip and networking events, as well as the interactions with industry leaders and professionals. All of those have increased their awareness in patents and IP as pertaining to computer science and the software industry. 978-1-61284-469-5/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE October 12 - 15, 2011, Rapid City, SD 41st ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference F2D-6