I'm hearing more faculty complain about ideas being "borrowed", "lifted", or "outright stolen".
The complaints usually surface after someone presents at an #onlineconference, an online #conferenceproceeding is published, or #googlescholar indexes a working paper.
Generally, the scenario is as follows.
A faculty member's work is placed online. The faculty member continues to prepare for journal submission. They are slower than expected, bc they have many work responsibilities, often young children at home, or an unexpected event, like COVID19, disrupts work processes.
In the next eighteen months, the faculty member becomes aware of very similar work. Often, they receive a paper to review. Often, they find an article in a quick-to-publish journal.
The aggrieved faculty member notes that the paper in the peer review process is one degree off from their work (same labels or data) OR in that published paper's author attended their presentation.
While one could attribute the confluence of ideas to serendipity or paranoia, the reality is there are faculty predators who lift ideas from others.
I know, because this has happened to me & members of my team.
When confronted, predators will a) deny deny deny or b) argue that is ok, bc presented or published ideas are part of the public domain.
This is not ok.
Predators fail to acknowledge that by lifting ideas, they prevent the idea's originator from receiving credit for their work, or worse, prevent them from publishing it in a journal.
So what to do? to protect your IP? And stay active in the community?
First, be careful about naming names. It's bad for your reputation. It is hard to prove malicious intent.
In computer science, conference proceedings can be the ultimate outlet for your work. In information systems, conference papers are an intermediate step towards journal publication.
While you may think the "thief" is a predator, in fact, they may claim to be acting in accordance with some field's values.
Second, recognize that once you submit a conference paper, you will lose control over your IP.
You can not prevent an audience member or reader of the proceedings from borrowing or building on your ideas.
If you are worried about theft, & know you will be slow to market, don't submit your papers to conferences.
Third, recognize that once you submit to a conference, you must move your paper quickly to journal submission.
Authors often submit their papers to conferences & then take a break to wait for feedback.
This is a mistake.
Once your paper is submitted, continue to improve it. When you receive the feedback, further improve it. When the conference is done, it should be ready for submission within weeks.
By being proactive, you minimize the chance of a predator stealing your ideas.
Best of luck as you move to publish your ideas!
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jason-thatcher-0329764_onlineconference-conferenceproceeding-googlescholar-activity-6936361851584753664-bHTU?utm_source=linkedin_share&utm_medium=member_desktop_web
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