Re: New US Bill re. Copyright/Federal Funding

["Marc Brodsky" <brodsky@aip.org>]

There seem to be some contradictions here.

On one hand the it's OK for the government to usurp the rights of 
authors as a condition of funding, while on the other hand a 
complaint is made about the publishers having contracted for 
those rights in exchange for their services.

The facts are that it costs to provide publishing services and 
that the government in demanding access to the "extrinsic" value 
added by publishers is asking for more than just a report of what 
it has funded. Many publishers have oft repeated that the 
government is welcome to ask its funded researchers for such 
reports, untarnished by whatever value and cost is added by the 
publishers (or the authors often on their own time after their 
funding has been exhausted). However NIH, as Dr. Zerhouni 
reiterated in his recent testimony to Congress, does not want to 
show the public the untrustworthy unreviewed reports without the 
value added by the publishers who do essential peer review - and 
let me add, some other tasks that may have some value like the 
stamp of the journal brand and prestige (if any), editorial 
feedback, distribution, copyediting, linking, discoverability, 
posting of free abstracts and searching, errata, archiving, etc.

Of course, not only does it cost to provide publishing services, 
it is also a marketing opportunity for some publishers and a 
service opportunity for others like university presses and 
learned societies - and sometimes commercial publishers. The 
opportunity is exemplified by a wide variety of business models 
for all concerned: authors, publishers, libraries, readers, 
governments, foundations, etc.  These models have changed 
drastically in the last decade and all stakeholders have 
opportunities to experiment with different ones. As an past 
researcher, author, research administrator, library funder, and 
publisher, I personally worry about the heavy hand of government 
tampering with dynamically changing experiments to favor models 
that limit choices and biases the publishing process away from 
one dependent on buyer evaluation of a journal worth.

Respectfully with apologies for the long windedness of an email 
response, Marc Brodsky

>>>
From: 	Peter Hirtle <pbh6@cornell.edu>
To:	<liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Date: 	9/24/2008 7:35 PM
Subject: 	Re: New US Bill re. Copyright/Federal Funding

At 04:01 AM 9/23/2008, Sandy Thatcher wrote:

>As a footnote, I would add that university presses are concerned
>about the government's move to make the papers of the Founding
>Fathers, as published with editorial apparatus by a number of
>presses, freely available on the Web without compensation to the
>presses or editors, whose work has been supported only in part
>by federal funding and in substantial part by private parties
>also. This kind of expropriation would severely undermine the
>ability of presses to continue publishing these valuable papers.

There is reason to be concerned about this initiative, but not
for the reasons that Sandy outlines.  You can see my blog posting
called "Free the Founding Fathers!" at
http://blog.librarylaw.com/librarylaw/2008/06/free-the-foundi.html
for the details, but the heart of the problem is that NARA seems
to feel that the best way for people to get access to volumes
whose editing and often publication costs have already been paid
for is by having people subscribe to expensive university press
delivery systems that limit how the work can be used.

There is no question that the editorial work of the projects has
been top-notch, if sorely underutilized.  Similarly, some
university presses are providing useful interfaces with
value-added features that are well worth the subscription costs.
There is no reason, however, that the government should not also
take advantage of its license (a condition of providing the
grant) to make this material available for free.  If editorial
projects do not like the government's license, they should not
have accepted the editorial funding - just as publishers who do
not like the NIH mandate should decline to publish articles
funded by NIH (rather than trying to interfere with the author's
rights as the copyright owner to license things as he or she sees
fit).

Peter B. Hirtle
CUL Intellectual Property Officer
Scholarly Resources and Special Collections
Cornell University Library
Ithaca, NY  14853-5301
peter.hirtle@cornell.edu
http://www.copyright.cornell.edu