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MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

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Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#81

Post by enriquto »

devit wrote: post #51
enriquto wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What was surprising was the number of institutions which had signed onto the framework - my alma mater included. I'm curious how many of these still have an Elsevier contract. If you ever tried to dig deep into the internals of a large organization, you will notice that they are perfectly capable of managing a set of self-contradictory rules. It is actually an amazing power. At least, this was my experience. For a…

It's easy to make this non-contradictory by making the rules apply only to future contracts, or only when the decision maker wants them to apply.

this guy manages!

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#82

Post by oldsklgdfth »

obiefernandez wrote: post #5

Further indications that Aaron Swartz didn't die completely in vain...

Came here to see that Aaron Swartz was mentioned, for people to remember and to learn about him and his incident.

I don't see it as MIT "doing the right" thing, as much as virtue signaling. As an institution and bureaucracy it tries to self-preserve. Either by saying "he are against technology being used for piracy" or "we are for the open spread of information". Of course I am cynical, but I don't think MIT decided this out of the "goodness" of their heart.

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#83

Post by dathinab »

setgree wrote: post #77
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #11

Here is the MIT Framework for Publisher Contracts: https://libraries.mit.edu/scholarly/publishing/framework/ It requires that: 1. No author will be required to waive any institutional or funder open access policy to publish in any of the publisher’s journals. 2. No author will be required to relinquish copyright, but instead will be provided with options that enable publication while also providing authors with gener…

> 2. No author will be required to relinquish copyright, but instead will be provided with options that enable publication while also providing authors with generous reuse rights. I've published a few papers (and have worked closely with Elsevier in a business context). When we published in a paywalled journal, we had the option of paying an APC [0] to make the particular article open access. So in that sense, we wer…

As far as I understood it 2. isn't about open access per see. It's just completely absurd that e.g. if I publish an paper and than want to re read it in a year I have to buy my own paper. Same when I want to give it to an intern to read and similar.

So it's about the author being able to reuse it for himself, not about open access.

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#84

Post by saalweachter »

JackFr wrote: post #57
Nextgrid wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they are perfectly capable of managing a set of self-contradictory rules This is caused by managers' and middle-managers' performance metrics being tied to the wrong outcomes. The top layer of management's target is the desired outcome. The bottom layer's (the worker) target is also clear, it's to do whatever their manager says to do. In the middle is where it often breaks down; their objectives are short-sighted a…

> At best, it introduces a large inefficiency, waste of resources and unnecessary busywork ("bullshit jobs" becomes relevant here) If the COVID-19 lockdown has taught us anything, it's that probably a full third of our economy is bullshit jobs. We're at best self-perpetuating economic 'nice-to-haves', at worst parasitic rent seekers, probably somewhere in between, whose real role is simply to distribute GDP more wide…

I suppose that is a third way to deal with automation.

I usually say, there are two ways to deal with productivity increases (from automation and industrialization): you can either attempt to do more as a civilization (build moon bases, increased consumer goods, etc) or you can have everyone work less (3 or 4 day work weeks, 5 hour work days, etc).

I guess you can also just create lots of bullshit jobs so everyone is still "working" 40+ hours a week without actually doing anything.

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#85

Post by nihil75 »

abhv wrote: post #39
underdeserver wrote: post #22

I honestly don't understand why JSTOR, Elsevier and others like them still need to exist. Top universities should just found a non-profit, per subject, with a single paid facilitator and a single paid editor (per journal) to find peer reviewers and edit the papers into a monthly journal. Modern tech has made it ridiculously easy to type, edit and publish such a thing if the inputs are LaTeX, Word, Markdown files or a…

I'm an academic. For years, my academic niche has tried to break free from the likes of Springer/Elsevier. Here are the bottlenecks: * There are wonderful "pre-print" servers like arxiv and eprint.iacr.org. However, these do not maintain the "archival quality" document storage that is needed for academic scientific literature. In day-to-day, all researchers use these to stay informed on recent results. But how to gua…

From my brief time working at Springer, seeing how their business model shifted towards services and processes aimed at enabling as many publications as possible -

I think basing tenure decisions on the fact papers were published there is based on archaic notions and misguided.

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#86

Post by nihil75 »

foepys wrote: post #58
pfortuny wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh dear, the burden of organizing peer-review and of consolidating some sort of "quality" stamp (I said "some sort of") is much more expensive than "nothing". I am not pro-Elsevier, I am just stating a fact.

The only people getting paid in the reviewing process are the journals that are only coordinating the reviews. Actual reviewers (aka other researchers in the same field as the paper) are working for free.

I don't think that's true 100% of the time. There are review-as-a-service solutions offered (and charged for) by the publishers.

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#87

Post by r00fus »

foepys wrote: post #58
pfortuny wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh dear, the burden of organizing peer-review and of consolidating some sort of "quality" stamp (I said "some sort of") is much more expensive than "nothing". I am not pro-Elsevier, I am just stating a fact.

The only people getting paid in the reviewing process are the journals that are only coordinating the reviews. Actual reviewers (aka other researchers in the same field as the paper) are working for free.

Perhaps this is the real change that's needed. Getting a review structure that rewards really thorough reviews, monetarily. Those reviewers then become like YT stars where yes, everyone can review, but these reviewers are top-notch. The payment structure would depend on fees from accessing the works or fees for subscription to access.

That might finally break (or finally justif) Elsevier and their ilk.

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#88

Post by dfdz »

czzr wrote: post #73

When thinking about the cost of providing the services journals provide, I’m always struck by the example of PloS - non-profit, set up with the mission of promoting open access, and just about surviving by charging authors $2000-$3000 per article. I can only conclude that managing journals is not as cost free as most people in this thread seem to think, for whatever reason.

You should not be getting down voted.

I am an early career academic; there are some new non-profit open access journals that I would consider publishing in that cost ~$500 dollars to publish a paper. Everything is on arXix so I cannot justify the expense (perhaps if I was late in my career with lots of grant money I would help to support these journals..)

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#89

Post by OliverJones »

Question: is there a consequence to MIT's library system? Do they lose access to that publisher's journals for the patrons of their libraries? Or are their subscriptions to the journals a separate business deal? How does this all work?

Re: MIT Ends Elsevier Negotiations

#90

Post by hedora »

abhv wrote: post #39
underdeserver wrote: post #22

I honestly don't understand why JSTOR, Elsevier and others like them still need to exist. Top universities should just found a non-profit, per subject, with a single paid facilitator and a single paid editor (per journal) to find peer reviewers and edit the papers into a monthly journal. Modern tech has made it ridiculously easy to type, edit and publish such a thing if the inputs are LaTeX, Word, Markdown files or a…

I'm an academic. For years, my academic niche has tried to break free from the likes of Springer/Elsevier. Here are the bottlenecks: * There are wonderful "pre-print" servers like arxiv and eprint.iacr.org. However, these do not maintain the "archival quality" document storage that is needed for academic scientific literature. In day-to-day, all researchers use these to stay informed on recent results. But how to gua…

I’m also an academic. Hash each paper, then hash the hashes. Publish the result with the proceedings. After year one, include the hash of the prior year(s). Problem solved.

Recently I downloaded one of my old peer-reviewed papers. The “archival” service added a spammy logo to the bottom left corner of each page.

I’ve been meaning to find the original and put it on my web page. Honestly, I might just add a list of all my papers with links to SciHub instead.

I’m allowed to post them on my personal web page according to every copyright agreement I recall signing.

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