Developing scholarly encyclopedias

Open Access Encyclopedias is the title of an article by Steve Kolowich in Inside Higher Ed about efforts to create free online scholarly alternatives to Wikipedia.

He discusses the realities of creating such sites and refers to resources such as Scholarpedia, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the Encyclopedia Virginia, the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, the New Georgia Encyclopedia, and Citizendium.

Google Books Settlement amended

The following resources are from the Center for Intellectual Property's Digital Copyright Listerv; subscriptions available at http://www.umuc.edu/distance/odell/cip/listserv.shtml#digital.


On Friday, November 13, 2009, the parties to the Google Books Settlement filed an amended agreement with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. Following are a variety of resources about the latest developments on the topic: Press Coverage; Legal; Overviews.


PRESS COVERAGE

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Google relents with revised digital books settlement.
Washington Post, November 15, 2009.

"In a move to allay its critics and the Justice Department, Google filed in federal court a revised legal settlement that would allow it to distribute millions of digital books online."

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Google backtracks on putting world's books online.
Sunday Times Online, November 15, 2009.

"Google has slashed in half its controversial plans to become the world's biggest online library in a legal move to appease critics, including China, the US Justice Department, authors and publishers."

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Google makes concessions on digital book deal.
Associated Press, November 14, 2009.

"Internet search leader Google will ease its control over millions of copyright-protected books earmarked for its digital library if a court approves a revised lawsuit settlement that addresses objections of antitrust regulators."

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Google, Authors try to answer book deal concerns.
Reuters, November 14, 2009.

"Google and the Authors Guild filed a new version of a deal to create a massive online library on Friday in hopes of answering antitrust and copyright concerns in the United States and overseas."

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Google narrows scope of book-scanning project.
Telegraph, November 14, 2009.

"Google and a group of publishers and authors have agreed to scale back the scope of their proposed digital books library, which could resolve a legal dispute and clear the way for millions of books to be sold online."

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Google submits revised digital book settlement.
Agence France Press, November 14, 2009.

"Google and US authors and publishers submitted a revised settlement to a US judge Friday seeking approval of an agreement that would clear the way for millions of books to be sold online."

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Terms of Digital Book Deal With Google Revised.
New York Times, November 13, 2009.

"Google and groups representing book publishers and authors filed a modified version of their controversial books settlement with a federal court on Friday. The changes would pave the way for other companies to license Google's vast digital collection of copyrighted out-of-print books, and might resolve its conflicts with European governments."

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Revised Google Settlement Offers Minor Changes on Antitrust Issue, No Response on Library Pricing.
Library Journal, November 14, 2009.

"Shortly before midnight last night, Google, the Authors Guild, and the Association of American Publishers released a revised version of the Google Book Search Settlement, with some clear concessions to foreign rightsholders (as noted by Publishers Weekly), a vague-and, to critics, fatally inadequate-concession on orphan works. There was also no response to library concerns about pricing of the potentially monopolistic institutional database-an issue that Google representatives say can't be addressed in the settlement."

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Google Books settlement sets geographic, business limits.
CNET News, November 13, 2009.

"A revised settlement filed late Friday over Google's right to scan digital books places additional limits on the company. The settlement allows out-of-print books from only English-speaking countries to be scanned, restricts the ways that Google can make money from scanning and digitizing out-of-print books, and requires a registry to seek out copyright holders who do not come forward."

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Google Settlement Filed.
Publishers Weekly, November 13, 2009.

"After two delays, attorneys for the AAP, Authors Guild and Google filed an amended settlement agreement late Friday night with Judge Denny Chin in an effort to end litigation brought by the publishers and authors against Google over its library scanning program. As expected by many, the biggest change in the agreement deals with international works. The agreement is now limited to books that were either registered with the U.S. Copyright Office or published in the U.K., Australia or Canada. The parties said that after feedback from foreign rightsholders they decided to narrow the class to include only countries "which share a common legal heritage and similar book industry practices" with the U.S."

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Blog: Google, Content Groups Sign New Google Books Deal.
PC Magazine, November 13, 2009.

"Google and a number of agencies representing book publishers agreed to a revised settlement covering Google Books on Friday, limiting the international scope of the agreement and providing a sort of trust fund for "orphaned" works."

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Google, Authors Limit Reach of Online Book Settlement.
Bloomberg, November 14, 2009.

"Google Inc. and groups of authors and publishers agreed to scale back the international reach of a settlement designed to create a digital book library."

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Google, Plaintiffs Submit Revised Book Search Settlement.
PC World, November 14, 2009.

"Right up against a deadline to submit a revised settlement agreement to a judge overseeing a lawsuit filed against Google by the Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, the parties filed their second take near midnight on Friday."


LEGAL:

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Blog: Google Book Search Settlement Revised: No Reader Privacy Added.
Posted by Cindy Cohn on DeepLinks (Electronic Frontier Foundation), November 14, 2009.

"Late Friday night the parties to the Google Book Search class action submitted a revised settlement agreement to the federal court in New York that is hearing the case. Unfortunately, the parties did not add any reader privacy protections. The only nominal change was that they formally confirmed a position they had long taken privately that information will not be freely shared between Google and the Registry."

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Blog: Amended Google Book Settlement: Doesn't Deal with Privacy Problems.
ACLU of Northern California, November 14, 2009.

"The Amended Google Book Search Settlement, filed with the Court on Friday, November 13, does not resolve the privacy concerns. The ACLU, along with EFF and the Samuelson Clinic, have been working to ensure that Google Book Search does not become a one-stop shop for government surveillance into the reading habits of millions of Americans and pushing for robust privacy and free speech safeguards to be included in the Settlement provisions."

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Blog: Is the Google Books Settlement Worth the Wait?
Open Book Alliance, November 13, 2009.

"Today, Google, the Authors Guild, and the Association of American Publishers released their revised book settlement proposal in an attempt to fix the deeply flawed legal agreement. Open Book Alliance co-chair Peter Brantley said, 'Our initial review of the new proposal tells us that Google and its partners are performing a sleight of hand; fundamentally, this settlement remains a set-piece designed to serve the private commercial interests of Google and its partners. None of the proposed changes appear to address the fundamental flaws illuminated by the Department of Justice and other critics that impact public interest.
By performing surgical nip and tuck, Google, the AAP, and the AG are attempting to distract people from their continued efforts to establish a monopoly over digital content access and distribution; usurp Congress's role in setting copyright policy; lock writers into their unsought registry, stripping them of their individual contract rights; put library budgets and patron privacy at risk; and establish a dangerous precedent by abusing the class action process.'"

(Members of the OBA include: Amazon; American Society of Journalists and Authors; Council of Literary Magazines and Presses; Internet Archive; Microsoft; National Writers Union; New York Library Association; Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America; Small Press Distribution; Special Libraries Association; and Yahoo)

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Blog: Revised Google Book Settlement Filed & Live Blogging The Press Call.
Posted by Danny Sullivan on Search Engine Land, November 14, 2009.

"As expected, a revised Google Book Settlement has been filed today - about as late as possible. The agreement narrows the scope to the US, UK, Canada and Australia. It alters how revenue generated by "unclaimed works" will be handled. It formally grants retailers who license out-of-print books covered by the settlement - including Google competitors - a 37% share of sales. It also clarifies how the book pricing algorithm will work."

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Blog: GBS: Midnight Madness.
Posted by James Grimmelmann on the Laboratorium, November 14, 2009.

"The amended settlement dropped in the eleventh hour. Here's a redline version and here's the related memorandum with the procedural details.
The best news coverage is the New York Times story; the best blog coverage is Danny Sullivan's. I've just completed a first pass through the amended settlement, tweeting all the way."


OVERVIEWS:

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Overview of the Revised Google Books Settlement Agreement. Association of American Publishers (AAP).

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FAQ Revised Google Books Settlement Agreement. Association of American Publishers (AAP).

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Amended Settlement Filed in Authors Guild v. Google. Authors Guild.

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Modifications to the Google Books Settlement.
Google Public Policy Blog, November 13, 2009.

"Last year, we joined with a broad class of authors and publishers to announce a settlement agreement that would make millions of out-of-print books available to students and readers in every part of the U.S., while forging new opportunities for rightsholders to sell access to their books. Tonight we submitted an amended version of the Google Books settlement agreement to the court."

Utah State University Press to become open access

A statement from Utah State University Press and Merrill-Cazier Library on Monday November 2, 2009 announced that USU will join Rice University and the University of Michigan where their university press has merged with the library and developed an online, open access model of publication.

From the announcement:

USU Press will adopt a new publication model, with open access as a central component and will move toward increased digital delivery of books. The library’s position will be enhanced as well, as academic libraries nationally take on a stronger role in the evolution of scholarly publishing.

“This move directly serves the needs of the university,” Clement said. “Open access allows us to go back to where university presses began — to publish work by all faculty in every discipline.”

At the same time, USU Press remains a refereed scholarly press, with the standards of rigorous peer review appropriate to a university publisher.

In an article by Scott Jaschik of Inside Higher Education today he notes that:

For the last nine months, the survival of the Utah State University Press has been in doubt, with fears that deep cuts being made to public higher education in Utah would end up killing off the publishing outlet.
This week comes news that the press will survive -- in part by embracing a new model of organization (becoming part of the university library) and a new business model (embracing open access, in which most publications would be available online and free).

Computers and Composition Digital Press is a USU Press imprint.

Open Access Week, October 19 - 23, 2009

October 19-23, 2009 is the first international Open Access Week.

Open Access Week is intended to broaden awareness and understanding of Open Access to research within the international higher education community and the general public.

Last years Open Access Day organizers SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing & Academic Resources Coalition), the PLoS (The Public Library of Science), and Students for FreeCulture are joined for 2009 by OASIS (the Open Access Scholarly Information Sourcebook); Open Access Directory (OAD); and eIFL.net (Electronic Information for Libraries).

Activities around the world are listed at Open Access Week.
Check out the week of talks at the University of Puerto Rico, the pre-week activities in Ireland, the PLoS competition for the best medical paper and the spirit of open access haiku contest from SHERPA.

Income models for supporting open access

A new guide "Income Models for Supporting Open Access" has been published by the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, or Sparc for publishers who want to support open access. From the guide:

Developing a sound business model is a critical concern of publishers considering open-access distribution. Selecting the model appropriate to a particular journal will depend not only on the expense hurdle that must be cleared, but also on the publisher’s mission objectives, size, business management resources, risk tolerance, tax status, and institutional or corporate affiliation.

This Web site and accompanying guide provide an overview of income models currently being used to support the open-access distribution of peer-reviewed scholarly and scientific journals. These resources will be a useful tool both for publishers exploring new potential sources of income and for libraries weighing where to direct meager library funds.

Defining noncommercial use study

The report and raw data from a year long study, Defining Noncommercial, on how people view noncommercial use was released Monday, September 14, 2009 by Creative Commons. The study was conducted by Netpop Research.

An excerpt from the press release.

Creative Commons noncommercial licenses preclude use of a work “in any manner that is primarily intended for or directed toward commercial advantage or private monetary compensation.” The majority of respondents (87% of creators, 85% of users) replied that the definition was “essentially the same as” (43% of creators, 42% of users) or “different from but still compatible with” (44% of creators, 43% of users) theirs. Only 7% of creators and 11% of users replied that the term was “different from and incompatible with” their definition.

Study noted by the 'In the News' email newsletter on digital copyright from the Center For Intellectual Property at the University of Maryland University College.



Study was discussed in Plagiarism Today blog from Johnathan Bailey.

Compact for open access publishing equity

Scott Jaschik reports in the September 15, 2009 edition of Inside Higher Ed that five major research universities, MIT, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University and the University of California at Berkeley, pledge to set up system of payments for work their professors publish in free, online journals -- aiming to shift economic model of scholarly communication, the "Compact for Open Access Publishing Equity".

Specifically, the universities have each committed to "the timely establishment of durable mechanisms for underwriting reasonable publication charges for articles written by its faculty and published in open access journals and for which other institutions would not be expected to provide funds."

Here's the same story from the Chronicle of Higher Education's Wired Campus blog posted by Ben Terris on September 14, 2009.

Speak Now, or Forever Hold Your Copyrights!

Speak Now, or Forever Hold Your Copyrights! is an article by Steve Kolowich on the next deadline of the Google book settlement from Inside Higher Ed, September 4, 2009.

[Judge Denny] Chin, the federal judge who is presiding over Author’s Guild et al. v. Google, Inc., has been inundated with letters and amicus briefs in advance of the September 7 deadline for participants in the class action to opt out of a settlement over the company's controversial Google Books project that has received preliminary approval from the court. A handful of the documents have come from professors, university libraries, and advocacy groups.

Auraria Library students and faculty search Lexis Nexis Federal and State case law or Lexis Nexis Law reviews using these links.

"Google's Book Search: a disaster for scholars"

This review from the Chronicle Review on August 31, 2009 by Geoffrey Nunberg brings to light some of the problems of re-publishing works without metadata, or to be exact, sloppy and incorrect metadata. It also points out the problem with depending solely on automated processes.

While many web users focus on the idea more than on when an idea was published or it's author, scholars need to know the truth. There is a useful comment on this review by John Wilkin, Executive Director of the Hathi Trust.

The review is at http://chronicle.com/article/Googles-Book-Search-A/48245/. Auraria Library users who are off campus will need the information at this link to see the article.

JSTOR & Univ. of California Press Collaboration

This is something to watch for those working within the scholarly communication arena. It is the beginnings of a new economic model. Here is a blog post from the Chronicle of Higher Education, Wired Campus.

From a press release dated August 13, 2009:

A new collaboration emerges to improve access to scholarship for faculty, students, and librarians. University of California Press and JSTOR today announced a new effort to invest in a shared online platform and outreach services that promise to create a more seamless, rich online work environment for faculty and students, ease the burden on librarians of negotiating separate license agreements with a multitude of publishers and independent titles, and promote a more cost-effective publishing environment.

University of California Press, the not-for-profit publishing arm of the University of California, and JSTOR, the preservation archive and research platform that is part of the not-for-profit ITHAKA, will work in partnership —and encourage others to join them—to make current and historical scholarly content available on a single, integrated platform, to provide a single point of purchase and access for librarians and end users around the world, and to ensure its long-term preservation.

Beginning in 2011, current content from all University of California Press published journals, including those from scholarly societies, will be hosted on a re-designed JSTOR platform. Faculty and students around the world will be able to access all licensed content on JSTOR – current issues, back issues, and a growing set of primary source materials from libraries – easily and seamlessly. JSTOR’s nearly 6,000 library participants worldwide will be able to license the Press’s current journals, either individually or as part of current issue collections, together with JSTOR back issue collections in a single transaction. The journals will also continue to be preserved in Portico, the digital preservation service that is also part of ITHAKA.

...

For more information about the Current Scholarship Program, as this program will be known, see http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/programs/currentScholarship.jsp.

Open Humanities Press creates five new open-access monograph series

New Open-Access Monograph Series Is Announced

By Jennifer Howard
Wired Campus, Chronicle of Higher Education, August 07, 2009

Open Humanities Press (OHP) is joining the University of Michigan Library's Scholarly Publishing Office (SPO) to create five new open-access monograph series with a focus on critical and cultural theory. "All of the books will be freely available in full-text, digital editions and as reasonably priced paperbacks," according to a statement released today, and they will be subject to "the highest standards of editorial vetting and peer review." .. more

Scholarly Communication Program Speaker Series Videos

Scholarly Communication Program Speaker Series Videos Now Available Online

Columbia University Libraries Scholarly Communication Program, Research without borders, held a speaker series on scholarly communication issues in 2008-09 and recently released all the videos from those events. See http://tinyurl.com/c4jrdc

Scholarly Communication video

From a talented group of librarians at UT Arlington here is a short video on scholarly communication. Their recommendation to speak with a subject librarian for further information applies to Auraria Library faculty and researchers as well. Make an appointment with a subject specialist for in depth assistance.

Study on rank of authors publishing in open access journals

Academic Rank of Authors Publishing in Open Access Journals by Elaine Nowick
Published in Agricultural Information Worldwide (2008) v. 1, no. 2, pp. 45-51.

Abstract: When deciding where to publish their research results, faculty take into consideration factors such as the prestige and readership of journals. The weight a journal article will carry is particularly a concern for pre-tenured faculty members. Previous research has indicated that some faculty members may have some concerns about publishing in Open Access journals because of a perceived lack of rigor and reputation of Open Access titles. In this study, the academic rank of authors publishing in Open Access and commercial scholarly journals was compared. Most authors in both Open Access and For-fee journals were full professors. There was no indication that pre-tenured faculty avoided Open Access titles. In fact, there was a slight but significant trend for pre-tenured faculty to publish in Open Access journals.

Note: Article available in the Digital Commons. See link on authors page [http://www.unl.edu/libr/liaison/facultysites/nowickElaine/]

Google, digitization & books

Of interest on Google, digitization & books

From the New York Review of Books:
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22281

Other resources:

"Impact of the Google Book Settlement on Libraries" by OCLC
http://www.oclc.org/programs/publications/reports/2009-01.pdf

A set of links "Google Book Settlement Link Dump Awesomeness"
http://tinyurl.com/9zph4v

A blog Google Book Search Settlement: Reviewing the Notice of Settlement
http://dltj.org/article/gbs-settlement-2/

The full text of the settlement
www.googlebooksettlement.com/agreement.html