Out of idle curiosity, when did "ramblings of a random guy" become "news"?

Ever since they invented cable news channels?

Absolutely correct. Been there, done that, had the heart attack at 40.

As I was laying in the hospital bed, wired for sound, my then-five-year-old daughter came in to see me. I will never forget the look of horror on her face when she saw her Daddy laying there, looking like he was one step away from dead. I decided at that moment never to go back. I walked away from a six-figure income to a zero-figure income, got my life together, wrote a book, earned a PhD, and appreciate that there is more to life than working all the time, especially when it's only to make other people rich.

It all depends on where you are, and what school you attend. I am completing a PhD in Canada at one of Canada's Tier 1 universities. I own the copyright to all my work, my notes, my essays, my papers (except those that have been published by a major journal), my blog posts, and my dissertation. And yes, I am funded by the university and a provincial agency.

To get my degree, I grant the university (and the National Library) a non-exclusive license to reproduce my thesis in their respective databases, but I hold the copyright. It even says so on the cover page. In fact, at my university, we even have the option to license it under Creative Commons (which I intend to do when/if I'm done).

The reason this doesn't apply to Canadians has to do with cross-border transport of both finished goods and raw materials. Truckers from both Canada and the U.S. routinely cross the border to minimize transportation distance (among other things, like providing just-in-time inventory supply). Doing the whole fingerprint/photograph thing would interfere significantly with commerce and manufacturing in both countries, so that's why the exception.