How to Protect Copyright Is Key Topic at Publishers' Meeting (Chronicle)

Check out this Chronicle article.


This is the paragraph that caught my attention:

• Some of the comments, though, sounded more combative than conciliatory. Fritz Attaway, executive vice president of the Motion Picture Association of America, dismissed the arguments of what he and other panelists called the Copy Left, meaning open-access advocates and reformers who want copyright restrictions loosened. "The intellectual base of the Copy Left is pretty flimsy," he said. "Our industries do something that no one else can do. We create content that people want."

And so my comment is:

Fritz Attaway is mistaken on both of his points.


(1) Academic open access advocates are not asking for copyright to be diminished in any way. Open access and the open policies behind it do not seek to remove or weaken the author’s copyright … in fact they work to help faculty / authors keep their copyright.

Open access simply asks that publicly funded resources be freely and openly available to the public that paid for them. It’s a very simple point: when I pay for something, I should get access to what I paid for.


(2) "The intellectual base of the Copy Left is pretty flimsy" is a pretty flimsy argument. The intellectual base of open licensing (which respects and builds on top of copyright law) is
strong and sophisticated. Watch Larry Lessig’s 2009 keynote to Educause.


Maybe the Chronicle could host a debate on these important issues – a live webinar, perhaps?


And then we, the tax payers -- who fund the K-12 textbooks, the college textbooks vis-à-vis students’ state and federal financial aid, and the academic research, data and resulting journal articles – could listen and decide whose view we value more. I expect most tax payers will want free and open access to what they paid for… for themselves, their communities and their children.


I live in Washington State. My state government gives $65M / year to the 295 public K-12 school districts who then spend another $65M in local funds – for a total K-12 textbook annual expenditure of roughly $130M for a mere 1 million students. The results for our investment? 80% of our textbooks are 7-11 years (on average) out of date; and worse - students are not allowed to write or highlight in their books because the books have to last for 10 years. Want a digital version? Sorry – that paper book needs to last for 10 years because it was so expensive. Lose your book? You're parents will need to pay to replace it.


Might it be better for districts to adopt free and openly licensed (CC BY NC SA) CK-12 textbooks that are both aligned with Common Core and WA state curricular standards?  Every student could have a new book every year, with updated content, the paper copy costs $4.50 to print so every student keeps their books at the end of the year – building an academic library at home, and they can have iPad, Kindle, Adroid and/or web versions if they choose.


WA State policy makers decided their 1 million K-12 students deserve better and they have acted.


I know what model I prefer (a) as a tax payer and (b) as a parent of two public school children.


Cable Green
Director of Global Learning
Creative Commons

Big Surprise: Journal Publishers Oppose Bill That Would Require Access to Published Research

Chronicle Article
Eighty-one publishers of scholarly journals today expressed their strong opposition to the proposed Federal Research Public Access Act, or FRPAA. The bill, introduced as HR 4004 in the U.S. House of Representatives and as S 2096 in the Senate, would require the results of federally supported research be made public within six months of publication. “FRPAA is little more than an attempt at intellectual eminent domain, but without fair compensation to authors,” Tom Allen, president of the Association of American Publishers, said in a written statement. The association, along with an advocacy group called the DC Principles Coalition, sent letters to Congress on behalf of the journal publishers who oppose the legislation.


Really? That's the best argument the publishers have? See David Wiley's response:

• "Without fair compensation to authors?" Do the publishers really want to go here? The hypocrisy is so thick you couldn't cut it with a chainsaw. I've never received ANY compensation under the CURRENT regime. The publishers are in NO sense protecting authors' compensation by opposing open access - they aren't compensating us now!
• I'll tell you what would be fair compensation to me, the author, for writing a journal article - let anyone who wants to read my article read it. I don't write to make publishers billion dollar profits. I write for the benefit of my field and, by extension, humanity. An open access requirement like FRPAA is the best compensation I could possibly receive.
• And yes, when the public pays with tax dollars for research to be conducted, that same public that paid for the research has an absolute right to read the results of that research. Buy one, get one - when you buy a pizza or a car, you expect to receive a pizza or a car. And when taxpayers foot the bill for a research study, they absolutely have the reasonable expectation of access to the results of that study.

I also added my two cents as a reply under David's good comments.

BIG Day for OER!

(1) Today was the first day of Open Education Week: http://www.openeducationweek.org

• Please join the fun - events are running through the March 10.
  

(2) Today Creative Commons, the U.S. Department of Education and the Open Society Institute announce the launch of the Why Open Education MattersVideo Competition (CC Blog Post)


(3) Washington State passed its K-12 OER bill.

What a day!  Go Open Education!


Cable


... you know OER is on the right track when the Secretary of Education says: