Just Another Day In Academic Publishing: Professor Posts His Own Article On His Own Website, Gets Takedown Notice Alleging Copyright Infringement
from the time-to-take-back-control dept
William Cunningham is a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto. Like many academics, he posts his own articles on his own Web site to help spread knowledge and boost his standing in the academic community. You'll never guess what happened next:
Cunningham and hundreds of his colleagues were recently irked by a takedown notice he received from the American Psychological Association [APA], telling him that the articles he had published through the organization and then posted on his website were in violation of copyright law.
As Inside Higher Ed reports, this was not merely absurd and annoying, but could have serious consequences for Cunningham:
The notice triggered a chain of responses -- including a warning from his website platform, WordPress, that multiple such violations put the future of his entire website at risk. And because the APA had previously issued similar takedown notices, the threat of losing his website seemed real to Cunningham.
Fortunately, Cunningham's colleagues rallied around him. A petition was set up on Change.org, demanding a "Right to share publications"-- and warning the APA that the reviewing that scholars carry out for the organization for no fee should not be taken for granted:
We engage in practices like voluntary reviewing for APA because we feel a commitment to producing a public good that others can use to promote scientific progress. By using these profits to restrict us from sharing our own work, you have privatized a public good and made our relationship transactional. Of course, it is entirely within your rights to do so.
If you wish to make this relationship transactional, we demand that you use the profits from our work to pay us for reviewing. If we learn that you have pressured any of the signees to remove their own APA publications from their academic website, then all signees will demand that you pay us $300 per review (unless otherwise agreed upon in writing).
Faced with this threat, APA backed down and apologized to Cunningham. As the Inside Higher Ed article points out, that's all well and good, but Cunningham still has alleged and unjustified copyright infringements against his name on the WordPress platform.
This episode highlights once more what a raw deal academics receive from publishers, which are able to disseminate papers without paying for them, and draw on reviews provided by other researchers, also for no remuneration. Despite that largesse, publishers then expect to be able to police exactly what the original authors can do with their own articles -- an outrageous situation.
However, the solution is not for academics to be paid for reviewing articles -- that is, making the relationship "transactional" -- as a kind of quid pro quo. The real issue is not money, but power. One solution is to publish in open access titles, which encourage the sharing of the articles they publish. Another is to release articles as preprints, and to bypass journals altogether.
Whichever route they choose, researchers should never assign copyright in their article to a publisher. That effectively cedes control of their own words to a company, and places them within its power. Instead, academics should grant a limited, non-exclusive license to publish the article, while retaining for themselves the right to do with it as they wish. Publishers have for too long taken advantage of the generosity -- and perhaps naivety -- of academics. Time for the latter to stand up for themselves and take back control of academic publishing.
Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter, Diaspora, or Mastodon.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: academic publishing, copyright, william cunningham
Companies: american psychological assocation
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
'What do you mean our actions have consequences?!'
Oh, to see the looks on their faces when they were told that unless they knocked that off they'd need to start paying $300 per review rather than having the researchers doing it for free... must have been absolutely priceless.
Now to see how long it takes before they forget and try to claim that a researcher is violating copyright by posting their own research on their own site again.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: 'What do you mean our actions have consequences?!'
Reddit has a subreddit called Assholetax. This would fit in quite well there.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I am not that sympathetic.
If I assign my copyright to someone else, be it for pay or just to have my name in a public place, it now belongs to someone else. Now, it is easy to get the information out.
As a condition, I can retain some rights, but I failed to do so.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I am not that sympathetic.
Not how publishing contracts are drafted Bill but glad you are smarter than every single academic in the world who needs to have their work reviewed.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: I am not that sympathetic.
I'm not sure what you mean, but the <A HREF="https://www.apa.org/pubs/authors/publication-rights-form.pdf">APA copyright transfer form</A> says:
The undersigned, desiring to publish the above manuscript in a print publication
and/or electronic information service of the American Psychological Association (APA), hereby assigns to APA on behalf of all authors, all right,
title, and interest in the above manuscript and any supplemental materials. (If the majority of authors or primary authors are U.S. government
employees, a signature is required in Section C and not in this section.) All proprietary rights other than copyright, such as patent rights, shall
remain with the author(s). In return for copyright, APA hereby grants to the authors listed in Section 2 of this form, and the employers for whom
the work was performed (if applicable), royalty-free, nonexclusive, limited licenses to:
that (a) the source and APA copyright notice are indicated and (b) the copies are not used in a way that implies APA endorsement of a
product or service of an employer. This license does not include the right for the author(s) to transfer, offer for sale, or sell the manuscript
to any third party.
institution in compliance with APA’s Prior Publication Policy and Internet Posting Policy (available at
www.apa.org/pubs/authors/posting.aspx and incorporated herein by reference).
You are certainly giving up the right to post the paper for all on your web page.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: I am not that sympathetic.
I am not saying that the contracts are written like that. Contract law 101, offer, acceptance, consideration = formation of contract. In exchange for giving up the copyright to his article, he gets it published and reviewed, seems like valid consideration.
Whether this is fair or not is another story. What stops someone from doing this on their own web site? What stops authors from demanding the right to place a copy of their own articles on their own web sites as a condition? Of course the publication may object and refuse to publish. That is the cost of having being published for review.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: I am not that sympathetic.
Which would tank many academic careers, as publications in journals is what is used to determine progress in an academic career.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I am not that sympathetic.
"If I assign my copyright to someone else, be it for pay or just to have my name in a public place, it now belongs to someone else. Now, it is easy to get the information out.
As a condition, I can retain some rights, but I failed to do so."
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: I am not that sympathetic.
Just because a rightsholder can do something doesn't mean that it should.
I think you'll find that's a common theme in Techdirt's copyright coverage.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Uncle Ben.
Yes, Uncle Ben.
I agree it was an asshole move for them to do this. The law can be an ass. Just look at Atwater v. City of Lago Vista, 532 U.S. 318, where a woman was arrested for a seat belt violation which only provides for a fine.
And Flash deserved it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Uncle Ben.
I was going for Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park, but I suppose "just because you can beat him up doesn't give you the right to" fits too.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
300 per review is cheap
I'm currently employed at BigCo at more than Sr. level (think Google/Facebook L6/E6). I'm also involved in the academic community, and am asked to do a set of reviews about yearly... averaging perhaps 25 reviews/yr.
I spend 4 to 5 hours per paper when I review; check levels.fyi... that's a fair bit more than $300 each. My employer tolerates me spending time on it, although the one time I took double load (can't turn down reviewing for the prestigious venue) I did get warned to lay off next year. Regardless, the monetary value of reviews I've provided is well more than what the APA people were threatened with.
At that, I don't mind reviewing. I've long ago decided to tilt my effort towards venues which don't take advantage of their authors. I'm more than happy to submit papers to and review for USENIX; they've long had an excellent open-access policy. All of the papers are free to download on their website, and they don't even ask for a copyright assignment, but instead for an unlimited license to distribute and for 1 year exclusivity for 3rd party distribution (that is, authors can distribute on their own websites/whatnot w/out limit). At that, I don't think USENIX has ever complained about any distribution; the clause is just to keep people from directly re-publishing in another venue immediately.
I'm probably spoiled by having a venue to publish in which has managed to support itself w/out resorting to predatory contracts; given my privileged position, I'm baffled why other fields don't simply take their publishing into their own hands.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Don't you just love it when copyright law is enforced? /sarc
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Better yet, it's time for the taxpayer-backed entities funding this research to require, as a condition of every research grant, that the resulting product must be kept outside the paywall. Perhaps just a bit of fine print in the grant which gives the agency handing out those tax dollars a non-exclusive copyright licence would be sufficient legal cover?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Taking a few specifics out of your text leaves:
Which applies to "user generated content" on ANY "platform"!
Why isn't GOOGLE / Facebook a problem for Techdirt, then? -- The big onez also claim a "right" to deny / control persons "a priori", before any articulable offense, and arbitrarily too. So says the Maz in his view of Section 230!
You're okay with corporate control elsewhere, but object when academics who probably explicitly agreed to hand over copyright. Hmm.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Why are you against the original creator posting his own work, blue? Do you hate creator's rights?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Taking a few specifics out of your text leaves:
The academic publishers say "If you publish in our journal, you assign us total control over the work", Whereas the social media site say "If you play by our rules you can publish here, and you are free to publish on as many other sites as you like". To conflate those two positions, and opinions about each is a being dishonest.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Dishonest troll misrepresent reality
Blue isn't interested in honesty, he'll happily lie and misrepresent so he can attack TD with those same lies and misrepresentations. And when someone points out his willful lies with facts he slinks off like a coward never trying to rebut.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Dishonest troll misrepresent reality
Slinks off like a coward?
Ever hear of Galois?
Was he a coward in your eyes TOO?
You are ignorant, obviously.
Strawberry Galois Fields Forever.
Singed,
Adam Schiff, Burbank Burns.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
He’s not just a coward bro. He’s an ignorant motherfucker, just like you.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Perhaps we should move these papers to a more neutral platform, like PACER?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I am blue. I am interested in honesty. And facts.
And the American Way.
Let’s go burn down Washington DC.
Except for the senate and the White House, of course.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Didn't you say that Prenda Law would appeal, and they would win?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
Oh no. Hamilton said Shiva would win, then Shiva would win on appeal. And also that real Indian would win.
Although he was right on that last one at least. Just not the way he intended.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re:
Not really. Elizabeth Warren technically wasn't a real Indian. In fact "fake Indian" was one of Shiva's pet epithets for his opponent.
Which makes all the more hilarious that the real Indian got scalped by a fake Indian in the polls...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Do you have access to Warren's family tree?
Given her level of conviction about the subject I would bet there's an indian on it. There's one on mine.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
For what it's worth Warren eventually apologized over exaggerating her Native American lineage to score brownie points with voters, but the distinction that Shiva Ayyadurai hoped to capitalize upon was meaningless to begin with. Appealing to Native Americans solely on the idea that your family is South Asian is a terrible election strategy.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
IP
It is so weird, but also I heard about the same situations a few times. It just illustrates the importance of being aware of intellectual property rights and obligations. Now I learn IP at college and must say that every student should learn it at least a general statement while preparing for my test here, I am understanding more and more that knowledge about IP can save our inventions and money. It is very useful in the project management area.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
You should be very careful with this rules, otherwise you screwed.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]