Intellectual Property laws provide creators many opportunities to protect their work. Unfortunately, questions often arise as to who owns created property, especially when the work is done at colleges and universities. By allowing professors and those working for them to claim their work, universities stand to lose profit from the discoveries produced under their auspices. Many are concerned, however, that as universities begin to claim ownership of such work, a disincentive to working professors will result. Both viewpoints are legitimate. Universities look to profit themselves by the publicly funded work of their professors and research teams. Professors want credit and the opportunity to profit by their life's work. Both sides recognize the danger in reduced productivity when creators become disenchanted with having their rights usurped. A resulting lack of research could prevent major findings in the crucial areas of pharmaceuticals and engineering, for example. In this current global recession, these financial conflicts exacerbate tensions between academic thinkers and their employers. In an effort to resolve this stalemate, Janis J. Bruwlheide of Montana State University-Bozeman discusses the "three C approach" outlined by the Consortium for Educational Technology for University Systems (CETUS) in Intellectual Property and Copyright: Protecting Educational Interests and Managing Changing Environments. Instead of focusing on economics as a point of departure, CETUS promotes the "three C approach" for conversations about intellectual property: creative initiative, control of content and compensation for published as well as unpublished works" (Bruwelheide, 1999).

Despite the inherent clashes over credit and remuneration, today’s technological and networking advances have greatly simplified the process of collaborating on ideas.  Many doors of learning and advancement have opened.  As new technologies arise however, however, idea developers look for effective ways to claim and protect their work.  Many have been disappointed to find that, especially on the internet, ownership boundaries are blurred, and determining publishing rights is difficult.  One possible solution to maintaining intellectual property is through the use of Creative Commons licensing.  According to the Taking It Global Website, “A Creative Commons license allows the creator, author, or artist flexibility to attribute parameters on sharing their work” (2008). The creator has the choice of six licenses through Creative Commons.  These range from Attribution to Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives.  Attribution is least restrictive, allowing new creators to subsume found material as long as they credit the original author.  Most restrictive is Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives, allowing new creators to download and share, but prohibiting any change to the original material.  Merlot and Connexions are websites of academically created materials, licensed through Creative Commons.  Creative Commons simplifies sharing and attributing credit.  There are critics of this intellectual property sharing system, however.  The group Black Star Rising, a photographers' collective, believes that “Creative Commons is being increasingly abused by for-profit companies who want free images” (Beall, 2007).