[GOAL] Re: Elsevier is taking down papers from Academia.edu

Jean-Claude Guédon jean.claude.guedon at umontreal.ca
Tue Dec 10 14:51:23 GMT 2013


I will go one step further:

I believe that all the instances noted by Peter are not simply
oversights; I believe they are part of a kind of "benign neglect" aimed
at creating as much confusion as possible. The result is that
researchers do not know which way to and, therefore, abstain.

At least, if I were a strategist within one of these big publishers,
this is what I would strive to do: avoid direct confrontation and muddy
the waters as much as you can while optimizing the revenue stream from
whatever source.

Jean-Claude Guédon


Le mardi 10 décembre 2013 à 13:05 +0000, Peter Murray-Rust a écrit :
> There is a general point: the Elsevier site(s) are riddled with Open
> Access inconsistencies. I have discovered at least:
> 
> 
> 
> * open access articles behind paywalls
> 
> 
> * articles advertised as open access but not labelled anywhere
> 
> 
> * (private correspondence) articles paid for as open access but never
> posted as such  (espite correspondence by authors)
> 
> 
> * articles without any statement of open access (IMO both the HTML and
> PDF should have clear statements)
> 
> * articles with conflicting messages (CC-BY and "All rights reserved")
> 
> 
> There are other serious deficiencies:
> 
> * the licence is often many pages down the paper (e.g. just before the
> references and very difficult to locate). It must be on the visible
> section of page 0.
> 
> * the Rightslink is seriously broken.
> 
> 
> All this gives the consistent impression (over at least a year) of an
> organisation which doesn't care about doing it properly and/or isn't
> competent to do it. It is clearly a case of retrofitting something
> that hasn't been prepared for, and without enough investment.
> 
> 
> The whole area Open-access provided by Toll-Access publishers cries
> out for a body which creates acceptable practice guidelines, monitors
> compliance, fines offenders and restores mispaid APCs to authors. If
> an author pays 5000 USD for a product they deserve better than this.
> 
> 
> Elsevier are the worst offender that I have investigated, followed by
> Springer who took all my Open Access images, badged them as (C)
> SpringerImages and offered them for resale at 60 USD per image. Just
> because OA is only 5% of your business doesn't mean practice can be
> substandard.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, Dec 10, 2013 at 12:06 PM, Heather Morrison
> <Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca> wrote:
> 
>         Thank you for the clarification, Alicia and Graham.
>         
>         However, on the Elsevier "copyright when publishing open
>         access" page, it states that under the Exclusive License
>         Agreement used with open access journals, "Elsevier is
>         granted"..."An exclusive right to publish and distribute an
>         article".
>         From:
>         http://www.elsevier.com/about/open-access/open-access-policies/author-agreement
>         
>         Also the graph on this page shows a one-way distribution from
>         publisher to user. Whoever created this graph obviously does
>         not understand open access. There is no author to publisher
>         (for final version) to repository to whoever option
>         illustrated, for example, and no publisher to user to
>         downstream user who receives article from someone other than
>         the publisher.
>         
>         Open access means that anyone can distribute the article. Even
>         with CC restricted licenses, the restrictions are specific to
>         certain types of uses (e.g. can distribute but not for
>         commercial gain - NC; can distribute but not change - ND; can
>         distribute and create derivatives but derivatives must have
>         the same license - SA). An article that cannot be distributed
>         by others is not open access.
>         
>         It would be helpful to review the actual author's agreement. I
>         don't see a link from the Elsevier site - can you point me to
>         a link?
>         
>         best,
>         
>         Heather Morrison
>         
>         
>         On 2013-12-10, at 5:26 AM, Wise, Alicia (ELS-OXF) wrote:
>         
>         > Thank you, Graham – all correct, and more clear and concise
>         than I would have been!
>         >
>         > With kind wishes,
>         > Alicia
>         >
>         > Dr Alicia Wise
>         > Director of Access and Policy
>         > Elsevier I The Boulevard I Langford Lane I Kidlington I
>         Oxford I OX5 1GB
>         > M: +44 (0) 7823 536 826 I E: a.wise at elsevier.com
>         > Twitter: @wisealic
>         >
>         > From: goal-bounces at eprints.org
>         [mailto:goal-bounces at eprints.org] On Behalf Of Graham Triggs
>         > Sent: Tuesday, December 10, 2013 1:31 AM
>         > To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)
>         > Subject: [GOAL] Re: Elsevier is taking down papers from
>         Academia.edu
>         >
>         > On 9 December 2013 00:20, Heather Morrison
>         <Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca> wrote:
>         > Alicia,
>         >
>         > According to your statement below, with CC-BY the only
>         restriction placed by Elsevier is for attribution. However,
>         the Elsevier open access license policy clearly states that
>         Elsevier demands an exclusive license to publish with open
>         access works (including CC-BY). Can you explain this
>         discrepancy?
>         >
>         > I don't believe this is a discrepancy. What it is saying
>         that the definitive record is published by Elsevier, and the
>         author provides an exclusive licence in order to do so.
>         >
>         > Re-publishing, or re-distributing via any other venue
>         constitutes a derivative work, which is permissible and does
>         not conflict with the exclusive licence (which is only on the
>         definitive record, not the derivative) - providing the proper
>         attribution is in place.
>         >
>         > Without the exclusive licence to the definitive record, then
>         as the author retains copyright, then in theory the author
>         could authorize publishing of a version of the definitive
>         record without attribution to the Elsevier version.
>         >
>         > It's a question of preserving the version of record. The
>         difference between the author providing a licence to Elsevier
>         to distribute an article under CC-BY, and the author providing
>         a CC-BY licence to Elsevier.
>         >
>         > Comment: Based on this wording it is clear that Elsevier is
>         requiring an exclusive publishing license. This is not
>         compatible with your explanation below that nothing is
>         required beyond attribution as required by the CC-BY license.
>         >
>         > It is consistent - the article can be re-published
>         elsewhere, providing it is accordance with the CC-BY licence,
>         including attribution to the definitive record as published by
>         Elsevier.
>         >
>         > G
>         >
>         
>         > Elsevier Limited. Registered Office: The Boulevard, Langford
>         Lane, Kidlington, Oxford, OX5 1GB, United Kingdom,
>         Registration No. 1982084, Registered in England and Wales.
>         >
>         
>         > _______________________________________________
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>         > GOAL at eprints.org
>         > http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
>         
>         --
>         Dr. Heather Morrison
>         Assistant Professor
>         École des sciences de l'information / School of Information
>         Studies
>         University of Ottawa
>         
>         http://www.sis.uottawa.ca/faculty/hmorrison.html
>         Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca
>         
>         
>         
>         _______________________________________________
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>         http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
>         
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Peter Murray-Rust
> Reader in Molecular Informatics
> Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
> University of Cambridge
> CB2 1EW, UK
> +44-1223-763069
> 
> _______________________________________________
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-- 

Jean-Claude Guédon
Professeur titulaire
Littérature comparée
Université de Montréal

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