> how is it that state employees (Washington, California) are "co-employed" by an organization to do _exactly_ the research that their home universities work on
They will work part-time for the university, and part-time for Facebook. I don't see why that's so shocking? Presumably the university only funds them part-time for part-time work, so it's not like they're not getting what they're paying for if that's what you're asking. This is a very conventional set up for academics.
Most employer agreements have fairly draconian claims around IP. And I believe that many universities require their faculty to run consulting, etc. gigs through their legal teams, and the university gets a "right of first refusal" of sorts on the generated IP. Many academics get around this by claiming that they are doing research X at company (more applied, etc.) and research Y at the university (more theory, technically different projects under different grants). But with ML it seems like it would be harder. Regardless, I'd love to figure out if we can get these agreements through freedom of information act requests, to shed light on what state-employees are doing.
Yeah, at my university partnerships between academia and industry have very complex IP terms that depend on the scope of work, how much of it involves novel research, etc.
And there, there's the clarity of "I'm an employee of the university". With dual appointments...the agreement has to be complex. Either that, or really draconian based on Facebook throwing it's weight around and saying "Accept this, or we'll find another university that will."
They will work part-time for the university, and part-time for Facebook. I don't see why that's so shocking? Presumably the university only funds them part-time for part-time work, so it's not like they're not getting what they're paying for if that's what you're asking. This is a very conventional set up for academics.