For context, I used to give a one-hour lecture as part of a course that’s held once a year. It was a paid gig, and I always enjoyed doing it. But I recently moved to another state for a new job, so attending the event in person isn’t really an option anymore.
The course organizer, who is also a close friend, found someone to replace me and asked if I could share my lecture slides with them to use. The request didn’t sit well with me. I responded politely, saying I wasn’t comfortable sharing the slides, and suggested that the new lecturer is experienced enough to create their own presentation. I also made it clear that I’d be happy to help if they or the new speaker had any questions.
I’ve spent years refining that lecture. It’s taken a lot of time and effort to get it to the level it’s at today. Of course, there’s always room for improvement, but the content and delivery reflect a lot of personal work. There are also recordings available of my past lectures, so they won’t be starting from scratch.
Now I’m wondering if I overreacted. I’m a recovering people-pleaser, so saying no, especially to a friend, was hard, and I feel pretty guilty about it. Should I have just sent the slides?
Edit for clarification:
I’m absolutely supportive of sharing materials with new faculty. Just to clarify, when I referred to “my lecture,” I wasn’t talking about a classroom lecture given to students. This was actually a professional talk delivered at a private event for peers in our field. It is a different context.
Comments
Not at all. Your lecture is your intellectual property. You also made the point that your lecture has improved as the slides have been refined. It makes sense that this person create and own their slides and presentation.
You did the right thing.
In your shoes, the most I would do is to share the organization of the topics, but not the entire material.
I think it’s well within your rights to decide whether or not to share the slides you put so much work into. I certainly don’t give my slides out to students unless it’s in pdf format. and for an hour lecture, I think it shouldn’t be too difficult to whip something up quickly.
that being said, I’m happy I had colleagues that were willing to share slides with me my first year as a prof. I don’t know how I would have survived teaching my semester-long classes otherwise.
I’m business someone would name a price. I guess in academia that’s taboo?
You were not being paid to gab you were being paid to deliver quality content.
You were right to decline.
While surely it’s within your rights to refuse such a request, what harm will be done if you do share them? As someone already commented above, if no one would have been willing to share their slides with me when I started out as lecturer that would have made my life very difficult. It’s up to you, but paying it forward can be rewarding on it own. Or, if no one ever helped you, why repeat it for the next generation?
For whatever reason, I would share the slides with no hesitation if I knew the person giving the talk and the request came from them. I probably would have just sent them in this case too, but I would feel a little weirder about it.
Personally, I see nothing wrong with your response and I even aspire to this kind of approach in certain situations. Would you hand over a completed conference poster for a colleague to present in a different venue?
That being said, I have definitely requested teaching materials from colleagues with the intention (explicitly stated) of identifying topics or features to include in the development of my own materials–e.g., requesting lesson slides on the PRECEDE-PROCEED model from a public health colleague, to guide my development of a community-based interventions lesson in a behavioral sciences course. The expectation is that I would never just copy/paste their work or pass it off as my own; I extract discrete components, modify them to align with my own lesson, couch them within a distinct context, and tell my students that I collaborated with XYZ colleague to create the lesson (which has the added benefit of modeling interprofessional practice).
So, while your response is totally reasonable, I think it would have been equally reasonable to share a non-editable version of the slides (including appropriate attribution) to support the replacement’s development of their own lecture while reducing the possibility of them straight up pirating your hard work.
This seems complicated to me.
It’s your work, and you should feel comfortable saying “no” if you don’t want to share it. Don’t please people just to please them.
That being said, they have recordings of previous lectures, so there’s nothing stopping them from copying your slides, and the only difference between them watching last year’s presentation and copying the slides from it and them getting the slides from you directly is the effort to retype them in their presentation software.
Additionally, you were paid for the work. Doesn’t your employer have some right to the work you did in their employ? I don’t know the details of the contract you signed.
I’m wondering what IP you’re trying to protect. What’s in there that you would be giving away that you don’t want to give away? You’re not going to give this lecture again, and even if you did, you might try to refine it and do it somewhat differently than you did it last time (you say you refined it over years–why would you stop refining?).
It’s your work, and you should feel comfortable saying “no” if you don’t want to share it. But the slides are available to your friend and the new lecturer in the recordings of the previous lectures, so it’s unclear to me what benefit you’re getting.
Seems like it is potentially burning a bridge, and for what benefit to you?
I think both his request and your refusal were legitimate.
Perhaps I am misunderstanding the situation, but it appears that your close friend, who arranged for you to get paid over several years, asked for a favor which would not have harmed you at all, but would have helped them in their job, and you refused. We can do what we want within the law, including shafting friends and colleagues who have helped us, but we should not be surprised if we are then shafted in return.
Its your copyrighted material that is used for commercial purposes. Being asked to ‘give’ it to someone else to profit from is not appropriate.
You did the right thing.
By the way, I don’t think your friend is being rude or nefarious. I’m guessing they just don’t realize that your presentation is more along the lines of an entertainer giving their work to another entertainer to perform and profit from rather than an educational teaching lecture done as a non-profit gesture among colleagues.
They wouldn’t think to ask or expect a singer/songwriter to give the rights to their song being used publically without compensation. Its the same thing.
So, I think there’s the Reddit standard of “my property, my rules” which is true inasmuch as there’s no legal standard for which you’d be compelled to turn that over.
On the other hand, “I worked hard on this” doesn’t intrinsically give something value. Is that really the only reason? If it’s not creating more work for you later, or taking food out of your mouth, I’d put that under the aegis of “doing a friend a favor” and call it a day.
So, I mean, you’re clearly acting to enforce your available rights. That said, if I were your friend and asked for a favor that didn’t involve significant effort or loss to you, and you gave me an intellectual property rights lecture I’d probably take you off my Christmas card list.
Don’t share your ip with people who don’t pay you and replace you
Whatever you do, put a digital watermark on it, to claim/prove it’s yours.
I’m with you on this one. I freely share course materials with other faculty at the institution where I currently teach. Anything outside of that is a stretch, and is optional. This situation you describe doesn’t fall into the sharing with academic colleagues category.
Personally, I think everything we do in the e academy should be public and shared. I hate proprietary nonsense- we spend so much time reinventing the wheel for no reason. The new lecturer will change the slides or the lecture itself to tailor it to their own specialty and interest. You’re just giving them a running start on how you did it. I always ask for my whatever tue person teaching something before me has, PowerPoints, syllabi, readings, etc. to get a feel for what someone else has done. And sometimes I borrow things but usually I retool most of it. Also, what are you out sharing it?
I share most all of my teaching content with people who ask, but I wouldn’t share in this situation.
More than ok for you to refuse and no explanation on your part is needed. It’s your IP, full stop. Most CBA’s protect faculty members’ and adjuncts’ materials in this manner. Edit: I see now that it’s not for lectures, but more for a professional setting…Then 100% it is your IP.
Could you attend the meeting virtually? And/or record your talk and they can listen to that? Pop in for the Q & A if recorded talk? I’ve been on both your side and the side of the person organizing conferences. These are options we offer some speakers. You can also still asked to be paid, albeit the amount might be less than in-person (without travel, lodging, in-person interaction).
Some organizers/ people think great talks are easy to produce but in fact, even a good 1-hr talk often takes many more hours of creating, updating, practicing, preparing behind the scenes. When I’m on the end of inviting speakers, I try to give them a reasonable honorarium (this is often for a non-profit so we can’t be extravagant) and state we recognize the effort involved.
I present quite often and I’ve had someone who has the same job as myself at another university ask for my slides. I just said I don’t share them. When I present at national conferences I don’t post them either. I offer my email and will send a PDF of the two slides per page format if asked. What I usually do is have two or three handouts with information. I want to share information, but I have known faculty at my own university who have copied others presentations after attending and it didn’t sit well with them.
You initially felt uncomfortable sharing your personal work. I would feel the same.