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In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

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Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#11

Post by dredmorbius »

DannyBee wrote: post #7
return0 wrote: post #6

How hard is it to nullify a publisher's copyright claim (which has been consented by the authors), based on the fact that they do none of the work, thus indirectly appropriating public money?

It's not possible in the US. If the authors validly transferred copyright, they validly transferred copyright. (There is a takeback provision after 50 years or so, but ...)

Anything is renegotiable or litigable.

Schools and academics can drop subscriptions or boycott submissions. Law can be changed.

Even if that's future-looking only, it can change the balance of interests for journal publishers.

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#12

Post by NotOscarWilde »

santaclaus wrote: post #9
danuker wrote: post #8

Why do they publish like this anyway? Does Elsevier offer anything extra? Or does it force scientists to use it?

Inertia, mostly. If you want your research visible and you want mad street cred for tenure, you publish in the biggest and baddest journals. The biggest and baddest journals are the biggest and baddest because they've been around since the days when scientists would go the university library to read papers.

> Inertia, mostly.

I agree with inertia, but I want to add a few more details from experience that could shed a bit more light onto it:

* There are not that many open journals around (see e.g. [1], probably slightly outdated); plus the throughput of a journal is generally low (the linked journal ToC has published 20 articles in 2015).

* Graduate students often want to maximize the impact of the journal they're submitting it to simply because the work itself is say of medium importance to the field.

* The review process takes a lot of time, it can even take more than 100 days. This encourages the researcher into trying as few journals as possible, which benefits the more impacted, more numerous closed journals.

* At least at my university neither the administration nor the school library promote open journals in any significant way. Which is strange, seeing as they are the ones paying the journal subscription fees.

[1]: http://theoryofcomputing.org/toclinks.html

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#13

Post by wolfgke »

dredmorbius wrote: post #11
DannyBee wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not possible in the US. If the authors validly transferred copyright, they validly transferred copyright. (There is a takeback provision after 50 years or so, but ...)

Anything is renegotiable or litigable. Schools and academics can drop subscriptions or boycott submissions. Law can be changed. Even if that's future-looking only, it can change the balance of interests for journal publishers.

Or you can show civil disobedience:

  > https://archive.org/stream/GuerillaOpenAccessManifesto/Goamjuly2008_djvu.txt
  > https://archive.org/details/GuerillaOpenAccessManifesto
If lots of people would do it, there can only few show trials be initialized by the publishers.

"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." - Mahatma Gandhi

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#15

Post by petra »

DarkLinkXXXX wrote: post #2

Thank you for sharing this. I wonder, apart from financies, how can we support their efforts?

One thing to do is to improve peer-2-peer technology , that it will be fit for the task.To do this we'll need a few things :

1. Torrents(as the most proven tech) should be able to handle storage of rare file (i.e. persistence) well[a].

2. A working peer to peer search mechanism - i believe tribler has that. It might need some customization for academic papers - but it's written in python , so it won't be terribly hard.

3. Tribler has mechanisms for anonymity and against censorship. One more thing that should be added is a secure pdf reader - maybe pdf.js via chrome is the most secure we have today.

4. Maybe there would be a need for some spam protection.

[a]search for 'bad for storing "rare" files' in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10962253

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#16

Post by tempodox »

return0 wrote: post #6

How hard is it to nullify a publisher's copyright claim (which has been consented by the authors), based on the fact that they do none of the work, thus indirectly appropriating public money?

What Elsevier does should be illegal. Giving up your copyright to make those pirates rich is the worst idea, anyway.

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#17

Post by wolfgke »

tempodox wrote: post #16
return0 wrote: post #6

How hard is it to nullify a publisher's copyright claim (which has been consented by the authors), based on the fact that they do none of the work, thus indirectly appropriating public money?

What Elsevier does should be illegal. Giving up your copyright to make those pirates rich is the worst idea, anyway.

> What Elsevier does should be illegal.

So you lobby for an abolishment of the copyright laws - interesting idea...

Indeed: It is quite impossible to claim that "what Elsevier does should be illegal" and not standing up for an abolishment of the existing copyright laws.

On the other hand: The copyleft free software licenses currently only work because of the copyright laws. Keep that in mind...

As you can see, your simple statement has deep consequences. I personally rather think, what many academics do, should be illegal. Here the consequences are far less radical...

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#18

Post by return0 »

wolfgke wrote: post #17
tempodox wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Elsevier does should be illegal. Giving up your copyright to make those pirates rich is the worst idea, anyway.

> What Elsevier does should be illegal. So you lobby for an abolishment of the copyright laws - interesting idea... Indeed: It is quite impossible to claim that "what Elsevier does should be illegal" and not standing up for an abolishment of the existing copyright laws. On the other hand: The copyleft free software licenses currently only work because of the copyright laws. Keep that in mind... As you can see, your s…

> So you lobby for an abolishment of the copyright laws

EDIT: to agree and amplify your comment:

In this case the copyright is dubious in the first place. Authors who work with public money should not have exclusive copyrights of the work they produce within this arrangement.

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#19

Post by return0 »

danuker wrote: post #8

Why do they publish like this anyway? Does Elsevier offer anything extra? Or does it force scientists to use it?

Inertia, but also it is convenient for funding commities and electoral bodies. It removes the burden of having to review the actual scientists, since they can rely on "where they publish". This is just as flawed as it sounds, and IMHO has led to a lot of dubious science in the life sciences.

Re: In Solidarity with Library Genesis and Sci-Hub

#20

Post by wolfgke »

return0 wrote: post #18
wolfgke wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What Elsevier does should be illegal. So you lobby for an abolishment of the copyright laws - interesting idea... Indeed: It is quite impossible to claim that "what Elsevier does should be illegal" and not standing up for an abolishment of the existing copyright laws. On the other hand: The copyleft free software licenses currently only work because of the copyright laws. Keep that in mind... As you can see, your s…

> So you lobby for an abolishment of the copyright laws EDIT: to agree and amplify your comment: In this case the copyright is dubious in the first place. Authors who work with public money should not have exclusive copyrights of the work they produce within this arrangement.

That is why I wrote "I personally rather think, what many academics do, should be illegal.".
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