"[Open access] would effectively nationalize... intellectual property that we produce and force us to give it away to the rest of the world for free."
In contrast to scholars who do the work giving away their intellectual property for free to publishers? newsroom.publishers.org/researchers-an…
In contrast to scholars who do the work giving away their intellectual property for free to publishers? newsroom.publishers.org/researchers-an…
This letter is not a good look. I am disappointed to see @TheOfficialACM as a signatory.
I'm not saying that publishers add no value, but "Americans need to lock up their science so the rest of the world can't benefit" is not the right argument.
I'm not saying that publishers add no value, but "Americans need to lock up their science so the rest of the world can't benefit" is not the right argument.
I’ve really been trying to keep ACM out of my increasing “burn it all down” attitude re: for-profit academic publishing, but wow, way to side with the Empire.
A provocation: What might it look like for other disciplines of academic publishing to move to something that looks like the law review model? i.e., journals housed within university departments, with students engaged with editorial work for credit/prestige. [Thread]
A huge amount of labor done for publishers (editorial work, peer review) is already free from academics, including students. Not suggesting that other disciplines move to cite-checking instead of peer review, but I don't see why students couldn't oversee finding reviewers, etc.
For some publishers (e.g., ACM), authors already do their own formatting, so that wouldn't even be additional labor or cost. And with physical printing no longer required, I'm guessing the major expense is admin support + hosting, maybe physical space?
Having journals associated with universities provides instant credibility, which might help with anxiety over publishers "owning" reputation currently associated with journals, which is part of what's causing this game of chicken re: moving away from the big publishers.
Maybe I'm missing something, but aside from coordination-based "switching costs" (which, yes, are substantial), I don't see obvious downsides to this model compared to the current for-profit publisher model. Curious about others' thoughts!
One of my plans post-tenure was to increase my ACM service, possibly in the area of publications b/c of my strong feelings (and knowledge) about copyright. But hearing that the pubs board was not involved in this decision makes me think that would not be a good use of my time. :(
I love that in the middle of conversations about the sad plight of for-profit publishers (whose intellectual property is in JEOPARDY!) there is an article about how academics are doing the free labor of peer review on Christmas. nytimes.com/2019/12/18/sci…
I know we shouldn't feed the trolls but if anyone is bored and feels like engaging with this feel free!
As a reminder to everyone, ACM might have sided with the Empire on this one, but it is still a non-profit, and publishing proceeds help run conferences, etc. However, Elsevier makes billions of dollars a year based on the free labor of academics. theguardian.com/science/2017/j…
An explanation of the for-profit scientific publishing business model: duck the costs of traditional publishing by not paying reviewers, editors, or authors, then sell the work back to those same people. 
ACM, on the other hand, is an example of a more reasonable actor in this space, with okay OA policies. I also think that if more work were OA there are alternate business models. (e.g., I would encourage continuing to pay for the ACM DL b/c it's an invaluable search tool.)
For companies that are making billions of dollars based on this business model, though, I have no sympathy. This is why it's so disappointing to see ACM take their side with a trash nationalist argument. I continue to hope they have some reasonable explanation for this.
Response. ACM has a point about due process. Unfortunately the letter that has people so upset did not say 'we are concerned about the lack of due process.' It said 'more open access will result in other countries stealing America's intellectual property.'
This paragraph in @TheOfficialACM's response I think is important to remember. These efforts towards OA are the reason that I am perfectly comfortable publishing with ACM. But unless they literally did not read that letter before agreeing to sign, I don't see how it's defensible.
