Copyright/intellectual property and peer-reviewed online publications

[Voyager]

@RealityChuck

But, at the same time, the magazine which seized the rights (and really don’t need them) can resell the work and not give a penny to the author of it. They can reprint it without additional payment, and if that reprint leads to other things (I’m thinking specifically of the nonfiction article “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” which was turned into a musical and a movie), they don’t have to give you a cent.

I’m not an IP lawyer, but nothing in the copyright form give permission to sell other rights, as far as I can tell. In the unlikely event that someone wanted to make a movie of “Tropic of Calculus,” I doubt the publisher gets to be involved.

That article was in Playboy, IIRC, so McMurty got paid. And plenty. I have no idea what the standard contract says for slick magazines. I’m sure if I wanted to modify the copyright form to reserve movie rights, no one would object. Laugh their asses off, but not object.

I’m not talking about credit; I’m talking about ownership. The magazine doesn’t need it – all they need is a license. The author can be asked to grant a perpetual nonexclusive license to the magazine. That would have exactly the same effect as signing over copyright, but doesn’t take the author’s rights.

Most of the sf magazines I see own the copyrights to the work - though it is negotiable, and you see people like Harlan Ellison with their own copyright notice. So, copyright ownership and payment are totally different things.

Library subscriptions are basically extortion: ask any librarian. They have trouble buying books needed because in part of the high cost of the journals they need to buy.

I believe most of the problem is with for-profit journals. Actually, those should pay, since they exist primarily to make money, not to support a field of research.

So these journals need better management. Like I said, I was able to publish two magazines in similar circumstance and pay my authors.

This shows that you don’t understand the motivation of people involved in this area. Almost all of it is run by volunteer effort, because we believe that the good of the field, and society, is aided by the free flow of information. Journals are designed to be run at minimal cost. Same with conferences. I’m running a conference this year, and the steering committee, over the years, have put in hundreds of thousands of bucks of unpaid labor (sponsored by our companies.) Are we being ripped off? Hell no, it’s our conference. For IEEE journals, the editors work for free, the publisher (the committees that supervise the magazines) work for free. I have gotten a coffee mug and a desktop clock during the ten years I’ve had my column - and I’ll get a certificate someday. Believe it or not, some people are not in it for the money.

If they were willing to pay $100 an article, none would go under: assuming ten articles per quarterly issue, that’s $4k/year. Assuming 1000 subscribers, that’s an extra $4 per subscriber per year. If they can’t raise their rates an extra $4 (especially since their library subscribers are pretty much over a barrel), then they probably aren’t putting out anything all that important to their readers. And if they’re charging libraries $300 (and some charge libraries in the thousands of dollars), that’s 14 library subscriptions to cover it.

You realize that most articles have multiple authors? Assuming $100 per article, that’s $25 - $50 for most articles. Since most journal are sold in a package, they don’t even get that much a year from libraries. Maybe the journal wouldn’t go under, but the number of pages might decease. And if authors were getting paid, how about editors? How about book reviewers and columnists? How about program chairs of conferences? We all benefit, and those of us who can contribute.

I’m not sure where that fits in. Colleges don’t give any monetary bonuses. And companies have no legal right to claim copyright unless the work is clearly work for hire.

A standard part of any employment contract is that any work done while employed related to the employment is owned by the company. If I wrote an sf book, that’s mine, but a technical article belongs to my employer. That’s standard everywhere I’ve been. Most companies have clearance procedures you have to go through before you submit also.

[Voyager]

@fuffle

I may be coming across pro-publisher here, though I actually am sympathetic to the author’s position and am a strong open access supporter.

I don’t have any problems with the author retaining copyright either. My understanding is that there is an issue with people reproducing diagrams from published works, or them being republished in article collections. It is much better for the field to have a central clearing house. There is no way you could practically get clearance from a zillion authors many of whom have moved since their paper was published.

A while ago I led an effort to select signifcant papers from the first 35 years of our conference. We published them on our website, free to all. No way we could do that if the authors owned the copyright either. fuffle, does your journal ever republish things? Would this be an issue for you?

My experience is fully in line with what you wrote, btw. I only peripherally see the financially aspects of stuff from being on editorial boards which is a big relief.

I’m not anywhere close to sainthood, but I was thrilled when my papers got republished, and never thought about getting money. Looks great on a resume. But the Jeopardy I was on got reran, and I didn’t get another prize either, so I suppose I got ripped off there also.

[Eureka]

Darn it, I was going to studiously ignore this thread on the grounds that I was sinking perilously close to suffering from gotta-have-the-last-word-itis. But fuffle and Voyager have both made posts that make me suspect that I may be touchingly naive about the practical realities of publishing a journal. (This might be related to the fact that my opinions and the degree of conviction with which I hold them are heavily influenced by librarians–including one in particular). (On the other hand, Voyager seems to have some idealistic views from a different angle). (And finally, I am not yet convinced that one of Reality Chuck’s primary points as I see it–that if paying authors for their work was high enough of a priority it could be done without causing the end of civilization/life as we know it/cessation of forward progress in the sciences–is wrong. For an individual society/publisher/ nonprofit/whatever not to pay authors because nobody else does is reasonable, even if it seems to show a lack of respect for the work of the authors.)

[Voyager]

@Eureka

(This might be related to the fact that my opinions and the degree of conviction with which I hold them are heavily influenced by librarians–including one in particular).

Librarians have good reason to be upset about the journal practices of some fields. I’m in engineering and computer science, where things aren’t too bad for the most part. My understanding of biology, though, is that there is a proliferation of expensive journals (the right toe of the mouse, the left toe of the mouse) that libraries have to buy. This is a serious issue, but paying authors or not taking the copyright is not going to affect this at all - except maybe make it worse.

Maybe someone is making a killing at journal publishing - but I seriously doubt it. If you want to make money, books on pseudoscience is the way to go.

(On the other hand, Voyager seems to have some idealistic views from a different angle). (And finally, I am not yet convinced that one of Reality Chuck’s primary points as I see it–that if paying authors for their work was high enough of a priority it could be done without causing the end of civilization/life as we know it/cessation of forward progress in the sciences–is wrong. For an individual society/publisher/ nonprofit/whatever not to pay authors because nobody else does is reasonable, even if it seems to show a lack of respect for the work of the authors.)

I’ve been publishing in good journals for 28 years - If I’m still idealistic, I need to have my head examined. I think the fundamental issue is what motivates scientists. It isn’t money, and even if it was, we’re paid well enough so that a hundred bucks is not going to make much of a difference. We win when we get a paper accepted by a really good journal, we really win when it gets referenced, and influences people.

I got some small amount of money for publishing a paper in the AT&T Technical Journal. I don’t think I even include that paper in my cv, since it is not an outside publication, and the money was trivial. On the other hand, a student of a professor friend of mine told me that he used a 15 year old paper of mine in his research. That was exciting.

Lack of respect would be bypassing the review process and trashing the quality of a journal, making all papers in it suspect. But I have never heard any authors complain about not getting paid. It’s not even an issue in my world.