Category Archives: oa.copyright

High Prices Make Textbook ‘Piracy’ Acceptable to Most Students * TorrentFreak

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“Through several lawsuits, Danish publishers tried to send a clear message: educating oneself through pirated textbooks is illegal. This message has thus far failed to make an impact. New research published by the Rights Alliance shows that more than half of all students find it acceptable to use pirated books. Prison threats are not much of a deterrent but they are willing to change if prices drop significantly.”

Good data practices: Removing barriers to data reuse with CC0 licensingDryad news

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“Why is CC0 a great choice for open data? Learn to love this frequently misunderstood license waiver.

Authors who submit data to Dryad are asked to consent to the publication of their data under the The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication, more commonly known as CC0. In doing so, authors are being asked to confirm that any materials that have been previously published by another author or working group were published under conditions compatible with CC0 and that they agree to novelly publish any previously unpublished materials under this waiver. 

Given the continually evolving research landscape, our curation team frequently receives questions about what CC0 means in relation to their data. Let’s review the advantages of CC0 as well as some common concerns and misconceptions that we encounter to guide researchers in data sharing and to explain why we only publish data under CC0….”

Ministers’ call for free open science publishing backed

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“Publicly funded research outputs should be immediately and openly available to all without barriers such as subscription fees or paywalls, say European scientific community leaders who welcomed a recent 20-point plan agreed by the Council of the European Union to encourage open science.

The Council, as it is informally known, represents government ministers from the 27 EU member states and is one of the key European Union decision-making bodies, along with the European Parliament and the European Commission.

After years of deliberations, which continued throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the Council’s Competitiveness Council (Research) agreed the text for 20 conclusions to encourage high-quality, transparent, open, trustworthy and equitable scholarly publishing, including cracking down on unsustainable author fees that currently prop up open science publishing….”

UCOLASC Statement on Retention of Author Rights in License to Publish Agreements

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“As discussed at our joint UCOLASC and Council of University Librarians (CoUL) meeting held on February 15, 2023, the Project Transform Negotiating Team (PTNT) and Project Transform Working Group (PTWG) have learned that many publishers are requiring University of California (UC) authors to sign “License to Publish” (LTP) agreements, which purport to grant exclusive rights to publishers and contravene the spirit of the open access (OA) policies and declarations strongly endorsed by UC faculty. We find this now-common practice to be unacceptable and therefore ask you to prioritize the issue of author rights and act on our behalf when you negotiate with publishers….”

Book Publishers Are Trying to Destroy Public E-Book Access in Order to Increase Profits ? Current Affairs

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“The publishers argued that the Internet Archive practices a form of “willful digital piracy on an industrial scale.” Judge Koeltl agreed, saying that although IA does not actually increase the number of books in circulation, “the Publishers hold exclusive publishing rights” and the IA “infringed the plaintiffs’ copyrights in 127 books (the “Works in Suit”) by scanning print copies … and lending the digital copies to users of the defendant’s website without the plaintiffs’ permission.” He says that they can only legally digitize books that are considered to be in the public domain,1 which would force them to remove more than 3.6  million copyrighted works currently on the site.  

Koeltl dismissed the Archive’s argument that their practices constitute “fair use,” which allows copying for criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, or research. To determine if a piece of content falls under fair use, judges consider nonprofit or educational purposes, transformation, and market effect. In his opinion, Koeltl gave lengthy explanations for why he believes IA is not fair use. Mike Masnick, the founder of Techdirt and one of the most prolific writers on fair use in the Internet age, gives Koeltl’s tortured logic the verbal flogging it deserves, arguing that the Archive’s lending is transformative, not for profit, and no more impactful to the market than the average library. But even setting aside the legal question of copyright infringement, we should still consider the destruction of the IA to be a bad thing for society. At bottom, this is a case of a cabal of powerful commercial interests using the legal system to bully a public organization that offers a superior service, completely for free, without stealing anything….”

EU-Mitgliedstaaten betonen die Rolle von wissenschaftsgeleiteten Open-Access-Modellen jenseits von APCs | wisspub.net [Translation: “EU member states emphasize the role of science-driven Open Access models beyond APCs | wisspub.net”]

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Translation: “EU member states emphasize the role of science-driven Open Access models beyond APCs | wisspub.net”

Advancing a publicly owned and not-for-profit scholarly communication ecosystem based on the principles of open science

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“Joint response by the European University Association (EUA), Science Europe, Association of European Research Libraries (LIBER), European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities (ALLEA), Association of ERC Grantees (AERG), Marie Curie Alumni Association (MCAA), European Council of Doctoral Candidates and Junior Researchers (Eurodoc), cOAlition S, OPERAS, and French National Research Agency (ANR). We welcome the adoption by the Council of the European Union (EU) of the conclusions on highquality, transparent, open, trustworthy, and equitable scholarly publishing. As key public research and innovation actors in Europe, we are committed to supporting the development of a publicly owned, not-for-profit scholarly communication ecosystem in collaboration with policymakers in Europe and beyond….”

Open Science: stakeholders welcome European efforts towards publicly owned and not-for-profit scholarly communication | Plan S

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For European public research and innovation actors, scholarly knowledge is a public good. Publicly funded research and its results should be immediately and openly available to all without barriers such as subscription fees or paywalls. This is essential in driving knowledge forward, promoting innovation and tackling social issues.

Key representative organisations of the public research and innovation sector have welcomed today’s adoption of the ‘Council conclusions on high-quality, transparent, open, trustworthy, and equitable scholarly publishing’.

Council calls for transparent, equitable, and open access to scholarly publications – Consilium

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“In its conclusions, the Council calls on the Commission and the member states to support policies towards a scholarly publishing model that is not-for-profit, open access and multi-format, with no costs for authors or readers. Some Member States have introduced secondary publication rights into their national copyright legislation, enabling open access to scholarly publications which involve public funds. The Council encourages national open access policies and guidelines to make scholarly publications immediately openly accessible under open licences. The conclusions acknowledge positive developments in terms of monitoring progress, like within the framework of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), and suggest including open science monitoring in the European Research Area monitoring mechanism. The Council conclusions also encourage Member States to support the pilot programme Open Research Europe (to create a large-scale open access research publishing service), the use of open-source software and standards, to recognise and reward peer review activities in the assessment of researchers as well as to support the training of researchers on peer-review skills and on intellectual property rights.”

Lecture: The Publisher Playbook Tickets, Thu, May 25, 2023 at 10:00 AM | Eventbrite

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“Libraries have continuously evolved their ability to provide access to collections in innovative ways. Many of these advancements in access, however, were not achieved without overcoming serious resistance and obstruction from the rightsholder and publishing industry. The struggle to maintain the library’s access-based mission and serve the public interest began as early as the late 1800s and continues through today. We call these tactics the “publishers’ playbook.” Libraries and their readers have routinely engaged in lengthy battles to defend the ability for libraries to fulfill their mission and serve the public good. The following is a brief review of the times and methods that publishers and rightsholder interests have attempted to hinder the library mission. This pattern of conduct, as reflected in ongoing controlled digital lending litigation, is not unexpected and belies a historical playbook on the part of publishers and rightsholders to maximize their own profits and control over the public’s informational needs. Thankfully, as outlined in this paper, Congress and the courts have historically upheld libraries’ attempts to expand access to information for the public’s benefit.”

G7 Science and Technology Ministers’ Communique

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“We share a growing concern that some actors may attempt to unfairly exploit or distort the open research environment and misappropriate research results for economic, strategic, geopolitical, or military purposes. This undermines the principles and values that underpin open, transparent, reciprocal, and accountable international research cooperation and the integrity of research and may pose security risks….

The G7 will collaborate in expanding open science with equitable dissemination of scientific knowledge and publicly funded research outputs including research data and scholarly publications in line with the Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR) principles. This is so that researchers and people throughout the world can benefit from them as well as contribute to the creation of new knowledge, stimulation of innovation, democratization of access to knowledge by society and the development of solutions for global challenges. This will also help to build more reproducible and trusted research results.

We recognize openness, freedom, and inclusiveness should be enhanced globally for the sound development of scientific research. When making decisions about openness, the respect for universal human rights and the protection of national security are essential, and principles and rules related to academic freedom, research integrity, privacy, and protection of intellectual property rights should be applied and upheld.

We acknowledge that open science platforms can allow the rapid sharing of pathogen samples and pathogen genetic sequence data on a global scale. They should also enable early development and more rapid, effective, and equitable access to MCMs for the prevention and control of emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases. Robust multilateral data sharing is needed to ensure continued societal resilience to the global issues of today and the future….

The G7 also supports immediate open and public access to government-funded scholarly publications and scientific data, and supports the endeavors of the scientific community to address challenges in scholarly publishing for broader sharing of appropriate scientific outputs. To this end, we support the efforts of the G7 Open Science Working Group in promoting the interoperability and sustainability of infrastructure for research outputs, supporting research assessment approaches that incentivize and reward open science practices, and encouraging “research on research”, aimed at helping to shape a more effective evidence-based research policy…. ”

Data Rivers: Carving Out the Public Domain in the Age of Generative AI by Sylvie Delacroix :: SSRN

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Abstract:  The salient question, today, is not whether ‘copyright law [will] allow robots to learn’. The pressing question is whether the fragile data ecosystem that makes generative AI possible can be re-balanced through intervention that is timely enough. The threats to this ecosystem come from multiple fronts. They are comparable in kind to the threats currently affecting ‘water rivers’ across the globe.

First, just as the fundamental human right to water is only possible if ‘reasonable use’ and reciprocity constraints are imposed on the economic exploitation of rivers, so is the fundamental right to access culture, learn and build upon it. It is that right -and the moral aspirations underlying it- that has led millions to share their creative works under ‘open’ licenses. Generative AI tools would not have been possible without access to that rich, high-quality content. Yet few of those tools respect the reciprocity expectations without which the Creative Commons and Open-Source movements cease to be sustainable. The absence of internationally coordinated standards to systematically identify AI-generated content also threatens our ‘data rivers’ with irreversible pollution.

Second, the process that has allowed large corporations to seize control of data and its definition as an asset subject to property rights has effectively enabled the construction of hard structures -canals or dams- that has led to the rights of many of those lying up-or downstream of such structures to be ignored. While data protection laws seek to address those power imbalances by granting ‘personal’ data rights, the exercise of those rights remains demanding, just as it is challenging for artists to defend their IP rights in the face of AI-generated works that threaten them with redundancy.

To tackle the above threats, the long overdue reform of copyright can only be part of the required intervention. Equally important is the construction of bottom-up empowerment infrastructure that gives long term agency to those wishing to share their data and/or creative works. This infrastructure would also play a central role in reviving much-needed democratic engagement. Data not only carries traces of our past. It is also a powerful tool to envisage different futures. There is no doubt that tools such as GPT4 will change us. We would be fools to believe we may leverage those tools at the service of a variety of futures by merely imposing sets of ‘post-hoc’ regulatory constraints.

Library associations across Europe joint call for action on eBooks – Knowledge Rights 21

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“National and other library associations from across Europe have signed a letter underlining the urgency to find ways to ensure that library users continue to be able to benefit from services in a digital world.

The letter highlights the traditional and essential support that libraries play in supporting education, research and access to culture while highlighting that current eBook models and licensing are undermining this….

It is essential to ensure that eBook markets work in ways that allow libraries to do their job and to fulfil their public interest responsibilities, within a clear legal framework. Working alternatives that currently exist rely on voluntary action by publishers, and do not provide full access.Government action is therefore necessary on all three of the following fronts:

Guarantees in law that libraries shall be able to acquire, preserve and electronically lend digitised analogue and born-digital works, such as eBooks, on the same basis as they lend physical works. This will enable more constructive negotiations between libraries and rightholders.

Work to ensure that eLending platforms operate in ways that work best for libraries, their users and authors. 

Aside from copyright reform and market regulation, support further investigation into the dynamics of eBook markets and their impacts on the achievement of public interest goals. This will also serve to inform wider cultural, education and research policies….”