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New Bill Would Repeal NIH Open Access Policy
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."
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.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
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.
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.
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...
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.
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!
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.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Good idea, but add the provision that a person could donate money ONLY to a candidate he was eligible to vote for. That way, money from outside the area (local, county, state) couldn't influence an election.
We've had problems with money coming in from other states influencing our gubernatorial elections, and money from other counties influencing our county commission elections. Why should someone who lives 500 or 1000 miles away have a say in a local election?
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.
This is my sig.
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!
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
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.