[GOAL] Call for applications - International Open Access Advisory Group

[Peter Murray-Rust]

I would direct readers to
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Clearance_Center to get an overview
if CCC, which is a for-profit company and has sued universities (and lost).
I would think that this new venture is a case of Openwashing of a business
model that is directly opposed to GOAL and many of its readers.


On Wed, Sep 11, 2019 at 2:38 PM Heather Morrison <
Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca> wrote:

> Peter Murray-Rust raises the important point that the Copyright Clearance
> Center (CCC)'s basic model fits with perpetual copyright, the antithesis of
> open access.
>
> However, I argue that the open access movement needs to engage with the
> issues that will or might be raised by this group. Following is a bit of
> background, concluding with a recommendation that copyright for scholarly
> works should be led by the research community not industry groups, perhaps
> coordinated by bodies such as Canada's Tri-Council of national research
> funding agencies.
>
> Many advocates of open access also advocate for the most liberal of open
> licenses. From my perspective, this is naive because some of the most
> liberal of open licenses, in particular immediate dedication to public
> domain and CC licenses granting downstream commercial use rights (CC-0,
> CC-BY, CC-BY-SA) grant to anyone the right to sell the works. This is
> already happening as open access works are included in toll access packages
> such as Elsevier's Scopus.
>
> Creators are giving away their works using CC licenses thinking they are
> contributing to a commons. The problem with this is that lack of
> restrictions means, for example, that images in CC-BY licensed works can be
> included either in Wikimedia commons for free sharing or to create a
> for-pay image databank.
>
> If OA venues are lost in future, the toll access versions may be the only
> ones available. As I noted recently, the attrition rate at SpringerOpen is
> 16%, with most ceased journals de-listed by both SpringerOpen and DOAJ and
> content available through Springer's subscriptions site:
>
> https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2019/07/22/springer-open-ceased-now-hybrid-oa-identification-challenges/
>
> The trend towards market concentration that was evident for subscription
> based publishers is beginning to be seen with open access publishers as
> well. Examples: Versita was bought by De Gruyter; Medknow was bought by
> Wolters Kluwer; Co-Action was bought by Taylor & Francis; Libertas Academic
> was bought by Sage; BMC was bought by Springer; as we report regularly,
> many of the OA journals by commercial publishers have no APC due to
> partnerships with universities and societies, indicating that traditional
> publishers are pursuing such partnerships on a global basis. Plus many
> commercial initiatives once thought of as OA friendly (Mendeley, SSRN,
> Bepress) have been bought by Elsevier.
>
> Both perpetual copyright and the most liberal forms of open licensing are
> problematic for scholarly works. Members of CCC, OASPA, and other industry
> groups (e.g. STM, ALPSP) are in a conflict of interest position when
> advocating for particular approaches to copyright / licensing, that is,
> members stand to benefit or lose financially.
>
> It is problematic for any of these groups to lead research and
> decision-making on matters of copyright. Leadership should come from the
> research community. Researchers need time to devote to such activity and in
> particular to coordinate. In Canada, coordination of consultation on this
> topic might best be led by Canada's Tri-Council of national research
> funders, perhaps in cooperation with similar groups in other countries.
>
> Dr. Heather Morrison
>
> Associate Professor, School of Information Studies, University of Ottawa
>
> Professeur Agrégé, École des Sciences de l'Information, Université d'Ottawa
>
> Principal Investigator, Sustaining the Knowledge Commons, a SSHRC Insight
> Project
>
> sustainingknowledgecommons.org
>
> Heather.Morrison at uottawa.ca
>
> https://uniweb.uottawa.ca/?lang=en#/members/706
>
> [On research sabbatical July 1, 2019 - June 30, 2020]
> ------------------------------
> *From:* goal-bounces at eprints.org <goal-bounces at eprints.org> on behalf of
> Peter Murray-Rust <pm286 at cam.ac.uk>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, September 11, 2019 7:32 AM
> *To:* Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) <goal at eprints.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [GOAL] Call for applications - International Open Access
> Advisory Group
>
> *Attention : courriel externe | external email*
>
> What is the relation of this group to the actual activities of CCC? Does
> it have the power to advise that it extends copyright and licensing to
> areas what those practices do great harm, and that the prices for re-use
> are often extortionate (one article in NEJM apparently generated over 1
> million USD for re-use of a scholarly article).
>
> If the advisory group were to recommend that CCC's activities be
> transparently regulated with price caps I might have some sympathy. As it
> is CCC will have to convince me that it is more than an unregulated
> rent-seeker.
>
> (It's also the antithesis of Open Access - the theme of this list)
>
> --
> "I always retain copyright in my papers, and nothing in any contract I
> sign with any publisher will override that fact. You should do the same".
>
> Peter Murray-Rust
> Reader Emeritus in Molecular Informatics
> Unilever Centre, Dept. Of Chemistry
> University of Cambridge
> CB2 1EW, UK
> +44-1223-763069
> _______________________________________________
> GOAL mailing list
> GOAL at eprints.org
> http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
>


-- 
"I always retain copyright in my papers, and nothing in any contract I sign
with any publisher will override that fact. You should do the same".

Peter Murray-Rust
Reader Emeritus in Molecular Informatics
Unilever Centre, Dept. Of Chemistry
University of Cambridge
CB2 1EW, UK
+44-1223-763069
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