New Bill Would Repeal NIH Open Access Policy 223
pigah writes "The Fair Copyright in Research Works Act has been reintroduced into Congress. The bill will ban open access policies in federal agencies, such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH). These policies require scientists to provide public access to their work if it has been funded with money from an agency with an open access policy. Such policies ensure that the public has access to read the results of research that it has funded. It appears that Representative John Conyers (D-MI), the author of the bill, is doing the bidding of publishing companies who do not want to lose control of this valuable information that they sell for exorbitant fees thereby restricting access by the general public to an essentially public good."
let be the first to say (Score:2, Insightful)
This may sound simplistic (Score:5, Insightful)
But my opinion was always if the taxpayers pay for it, the taxpayers own it. Research, patents and discoveries and even software. At a minimum the government should be able to transfer licenses from one branch to another. If your research is that valuable, don't take federal money. A lot of universities are taking federal money for research and then selling those discoveries to companies that sell them back to the taxpayers. It's not always that clean but it just doesn't seem right.
If you don't like the restrictions, don't sell to the government. I love the way so many institutions, lately including banks, are acting like they're doing us a favor taking federal money. And there's always someone who will yap about government wouldn't be able to get access the best software tools. I doubt that. I'm not talking about making anything the government buys open source, just that government can move software licenses around based on need.
Funny a legislator from Michigan would be the tool of the publishing industry. I didn't realize textbooks were big business up there.
I think I'm gonna cry (Score:5, Insightful)
Okay, what went wrong? What happened? Has our government always been like this? Is there a single politician who won't be bought? How can we fix all this (not with these two parties, that's for sure). The Republicans have been bought by the religious and oil, and the Democrats have been bought by the copyright zealots and god-knows-who-else.
We need elections based on instant run-off or something so that third parties actually have a chance. I can't take this anymore. There needs to be some sort of fundamental change.
It seems like everything is ruined forever.
Only in America (TM) (Score:3, Insightful)
this is what happens when you let go of rules and regulations. the groups who want to prosper at the expense of everyone else goes berserk, and even tries to rob you of what you pay for.
balance is the key. government has to be a regulatory tool, a heavy handed hammer of ALL people against groups who seek privilege. that includes groups that seek to exploit free market principles by yelping and wanking 'deregulation' in order to propagate scams like wall street did in this hedge fund fraud.
before any holistic economists try to yelp the same criminal 'regulation is bad' line that alan greenspan et all yelped in the last 20 years, i want to warn them ; before you have any chance of doing that, you will have to explain me why we shouldnt let go of judiciary, police, and criminal law, if we were to let go of regulations in business.
because, they are in the same status - both are regulatory, order providing arrangements of rules and laws to ensure that noone pulls any shit on anyone else.
Re:Why are they so easyly bought or manipulated (Score:3, Insightful)
because the only way to get votes is not being smart/capable/listening to what the people want
but campaining/throwing tons of money at it. and there's only one source for that kind of money, so what do you expect?
What a dipshit. (Score:5, Insightful)
Really - I mean *really* - you want to take research we fund explicitly for public enrichment, and deny public access to the results of that research on the basis of copyright interpretation?
There is no justification for slowing down the progress of science for the benefit of *publishers*.
Rep. Conyers, you truly are a dipshit of the highest caliber.
Re:Well, of course! (Score:5, Insightful)
Publishing companies need to make enormous amounts of money so they can do important things like:
Scientific authors don't get paid for publications. Often the author has to pay a publication charge for in order to get published. In particular if you have color figures, you often have to pay extra.
Offering large emoluments for Reviewers
Referees don't get paid either, they do it out of the kindness of their hearts. :) Actually why they do it is a bit of a mystery, but it keeps you connected with the academic community.
Hiring top-notch editors to perform quality typesetting
Many journal force authors to fiddle with their manuscript endlessly until the formatting meets the journals specification.
Host powerful commercial publishing access sites, as universities, libraries, and professional organizations are simply unwilling to pitch in.
Not sure what this means...
It sounds simplistic because it is. (Score:4, Insightful)
But my opinion was always if the taxpayers pay for it, the taxpayers own it. Research, patents and discoveries and even software.
They do, in exactly the same sense that the taxpayers own Navy destroyers, which is to say, collectively, with no individualized control.
If your research is that valuable, don't take federal money. A lot of universities are taking federal money for research and then selling those discoveries to companies that sell them back to the taxpayers. It's not always that clean but it just doesn't seem right.
That's not what's happening, nor is it federal money being taken. Federally-funded research products lead to patentable inventions. Those patents are held by the government. In order to make that research commercially valuable, additional research is needed and private investment is required to bring the research to a marketable level of maturity. In turn, private entities agree to fund the necessary further research, without which the first sets of patents are worthless.
If it's a 10 step process from theory to application and the federal project accomplishes the first four steps, and a private party comes in and develops 5 through 10, including patentable material, they have the right to that patent same as anyone else. Sometimes, a corporation will agree to continue/complete the research and pay the government for an exclusive license, which in turn funds further government research projects.
If you had a proposal to do the research for free, complete the project for free, and freely license the results, you would be an attractive bidder for the exclusive license. In the real world, though, no one ever makes such a proposal, so the whole notion is academic.
You've got $100 million to spend on research. Government projects don't care about commercialization, which is a difficult, time consuming, and expensive process. The end result is one of two basic scenarios: (1) everybody gets a fair chance at the fruits of the research, and it's the standard patent race to see who can fill in the gaps first, or (2) private party partners with the government, writes a check that (more than) covers the taxpayer expenditure on the research, and gets an exclusive license (but not ownership of the patent).
The second scenario, so often shortsightedly maligned, generates money for further public research. In effect, when a company purchases the project, it is as if they funded it directly themselves. They get a license to it with varying levels of restrictions, which serves the public interest better than actually granting ownership of the patent, and the upside to this restriction for the corporations is that they didn't bear the risk of the research failing. It's a win-win situation plainly visible for anyone who doesn't have his head up his ass.
If you don't like the restrictions, don't sell to the government.
And here you go off the rails entirely. Sell what to the government? Banks? What? Wouldn't be able to access what? Seriously, think things out before posting, people.
Re:Donkeys screw us over too! Woo hoo! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:This is silly. (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, the journals have a great business model (for them) right now:
- Publish expensive journal that libraries have little choice about subscribing to.
- Receive free content from scientists.
- Force scientists to transfer copyright.
- Get other scientists to to the hard work of reviewing the articles for free.
- Add 'page charges' for the privilege of publication.
- Add extra charges for colour figures (though most articles are downloaded, coloured electrons are more expensive).
- Charge the authors again for reprints.
- Whine about 'unfair competition' from Open Access.
- Pay off our democratic representatives.
- Profit!
Since you seem to know how this works... (Score:3, Insightful)
I've long wondered--what is it that academic journals DO, precisely? They don't seem to provide any services that a vanity press couldn't do better and cheaper.
Is there something I'm unaware of that they merely overcharge massively for, or are they actually the complete and total parasites that they sound like?
Re:Since you seem to know how this works... (Score:3, Insightful)
"Is there something I'm unaware of that they merely overcharge massively for"
'Reputation'
"or are they actually the complete and total parasites that they sound like?"
Pretty much.
Re:Republicans cost FAR more. (Score:0, Insightful)
Well, add it all up and the Democrats will have spent a couple trillion dollars in a few months' time and then not tracked what it was used for. I think we have a record.
Re:let be the first to say (Score:3, Insightful)
>>>YOU DEMOCRAT BASTARD!
Fixed that for you. Why would a Democrat Conyers from Michgan want to close-off access to taxpayer-paid-for research? It should be public domain and available to all the U.S. People.
Re:Republicans cost FAR more. (Score:5, Insightful)
I didn't mean what they cost us in the budget. I meant what it costs to buy them. Bribing Democrats is generally more expensive. Look at what the campaign contributions cost and how they vote, then come back.
SO we need a public research clearing house. (Score:3, Insightful)
So what you are really saying is that yes, you get paid enough to do the work but have no money to air the results in any meaningful way. So what we really need is a Research Data Office consisting of some number of research collectors. The collectors would basically be liased to the various institutions engaged in federal funding research and it would be their job to capture all of the particulars of all the experiments, load the steps and results into a federal database, which would then be available for public use. Scientists participating in federally funded research would be required to invest some time in peer review of this database, and in the very least the database could track of who has independently repeated an experiment set and achieved similar results. Traditional publishers, if they were American, could then cherry pick their favorite experiments for their own commercial use, as the data would be public domain, but the notes and particulars of the experiments would be available for everyone.
Re:I think I'm gonna cry (Score:5, Insightful)
Is there a single politician who won't be bought?
Yes, they do exist in the US. I'm talking about folks like Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul: They very definitely stand for something, and don't compromise their principles. They're usually dismissed and ridiculed by "news" organizations.
For instance, no one would have asked Hillary Clinton during a debate if she'd seen a UFO. There's no good way to answer a question like that: if you say "no" all sorts of political hacks will try to prove that you did, and if you say "yes" you're treated like some sort of nut.
I blame Bush...Somehow. (Score:2, Insightful)
I blame Bush...Somehow.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Uh, that doesn't help us... (Score:4, Insightful)
You speak of Clinton as some great leader on budget deficits. His proposed budget in 1992 showed deficit spending without reduction for the foreseeable future.
This is simply not true. Clinton ran on budget deficit reduction as part of his campaign for 1992. I read his campaign book. He promised a balanced budget by the end of his second term, and he delivered it.
The fact of the matter is this, despite all rhetoric, any other way, Republicans have been terrible at balanced budgets. Reagan was terrible, Bush the elder was terrible, and Bush Jr was by far the worst.
dems vs republicans (Score:4, Insightful)
so, one group spent more money in attempting to secure the financial health & fiscal saftey of it's own nation.
population 305 million
The other group spent less than that- on an unpopular invasion of a foreign country of 29.2 million..
but hey! the second group did spend less money!
Re:Why are they so easyly bought or manipulated (Score:2, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:let be the first to say (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Only in America (TM) (Score:3, Insightful)
a regulatory tool that belongs to ALL people can be properly ensured to remain in control of the people through increased transparency.
Re:let be the first to say (Score:3, Insightful)
This bill was probably written by the publishing industry. I'd be surprised if Conyers has even read the bill he's put his name on.
The sooner you learn that politicans don't need to belong to any particular party to be purchased, the better off you'll be.
Re:Donkeys screw us over too! Woo hoo! (Score:3, Insightful)
Pirate stuff. Yeah, some people will whine about ohhhhh, you're breaking the law; but when chances of being caught are very low and the media cartels are aggressively ceding the moral high ground to the pirates, who gives a crap?
We might add that people are missing a significant part by being ignorant of the history of this issue. For more than a century, ever since sound recordings became possible, the recording industry has a very consistent history of crying "Piracy!" for every new technology. They try mightily to stop every invention and new product, out of fear that it will kill their business that's based on the current technology. Then, a few years later when the "pirates" have become successful, the industry buys them out and proudly proclaims that the new technology was their invention all along. The companies that don't switch to the new technology go out of business, and sometimes newcomers make it big. And then, a new kind of recording gadget comes along, and the cry of "Piracy!" is heard again.
In another decade, we can expect to look back at the same thing. This newfangled "intarweb" thingy will be the established distribution system, and the recording industry will be claiming that they invented it and magnanimously delivered it to the masses. But some new technology will be appearing that will be a threat to the way they do business over the Internet, and they'll be hollering "Piracy!" all over again.
Subsidize the Cost, Privatize the Profit (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:let be the first to say (Score:4, Insightful)
And the diff between Nobama and McSame was.....what exactly? I mean seriously, give me a break. They are two sides of the same coin. All you are picking is Coke VS Pepsi anymore.
Fuck off. It was that kind of talk that got us W in 2000.