Info/Law

The Scholar’s Copyright Project at Science Commons has developed an exciting tool for scholars who want to ensure that their work is accessible in a more open way. They have promulgated three different versions of a model “Author’s Addendum.” Essentially, these contain contractual language allowing authors to retain certain rights under copyright law, such as the right to post a copy of the article online. An addendum can be appended to the standard form contracts used by academic journals. Perhaps somewhat confusingly, they can be used for publications in any field and not just the sciences, even though Science Commons developed them.

The journals can always say no, but we have found in research for the Berkman Center’s “Digital Learning” white paper that many journals are willing to allow for some forms of open distribution if an author pushes them just a little. Science Commons has found the same, and notes that “We are aware of no instance in which a publisher has refused to publish an article where the author sought to retain some non-exclusive rights to the article.”

Submitting an author’s addendum like one of these is a good means of applying that push. Of course, big-shot scholars are better positioned to get such concessions than little-known untenured faculty. But it is important for everyone to at least try — it encourages thought on the issue and hopefully it begins to change practices somewhat. In addition, with Science Commons now starting to track which journals resist, there may be some public shaming of recalcitrant journals. And you never know — they may say yes.

Hat tip to Sivacracy, which also carries comments about the new initiative from leading information law professor James Boyle.

On a related note, this recent article in Wired discusses Harold Varmus’ efforts to promote open access publishing, and features his visit to the Berkman Center (sponsored by open access booster Charlie Nesson) to talk about the subject with the student editors of Harvard’s law journals.

My two cents: law journals should be uniquely positioned to allow open access, because they are generally nonprofit entities, either independent or controlled by the law schools. In many other fields, by contrast, journals generate profit for either a large publishing company or a scholarly society with few other revenue sources. One problem with law review adoption of open access is that inexperienced student editors, who turn over every year, have a lot of other more immediate decisions to worry about (and they may not want to rock the boat by changing policy). Another problem, as the Wired article shows, is that Lexis and Westlaw want journals to resist open access policies. And of course, no one wants to be the first to make the move.

However, the editors at leading law reivews recently got together to coordinate restrictions on the length of law review articles. Maybe they can do the same for this worthy cause. And if people like Nesson, Boyle, Larry Lessig, Mike Carroll and others keep pushing, we could see some real change.

Filed under: Berkman, Copyright, Education & Copyright, Law School, Open Access, Scholarship