5.0020 Copyright (3/163)

Elaine Brennan & Allen Renear (EDITORS@BROWNVM.BITNET)
Fri, 10 May 91 11:33:04 EDT

Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 5, No. 0020. Friday, 10 May 1991.

(1) Date: Thu, May 9, 1991 12:30:44 PM (59 lines)
From: Adam Engst <ace%tidbits.UUCP@theory.TN.CORNELL.EDU>
Subject: Re:5.0012 Copyright & CNI

(2) Date: 08 May 91 23:53:48 EDT (25 lines)
From: George Aichele <73760.1176@CompuServe.COM>
Subject: replaced message re copyright

(3) Date: Tue, 07 May 91 22:42:36 CST (79 lines)
From: "Robin C. Cover" <ZRCC1001@SMUVM1>
Subject: COPYRIGHT: METAPHORS FOR INEQUITY AND DYSFUNCTION

(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu, May 9, 1991 12:30:44 PM
From: Adam Engst <ace%tidbits.UUCP@theory.TN.CORNELL.EDU>
Subject: Re:5.0012 Copyright & CNI

Not being an academic, I haven't been following this copyright discussion as
closely as I should be. However, I have seen no mention of the
copyright/royalty ideas embodied in Ted Nelson's Xanadu system. The basic idea
is that there are two types of documents, public and private. Private documents
are just that, private, and no one else can see them. Public documents are
available for anyone on the Xanadu network to read and include in their own
writings or research. The trick is that the system keeps close track of who
"owns" what documents (you own what you create, but not what you quote from
someone else) and how much those documents have been used by others (read and
included in other texts via links).

So if I write a paper on Oedipal tragicomedy and make that a public document,
and you write a refutal of everything I say using quotes from my paper, the
system will assign very small royalties from your account to mine. If the
argument then becomes a big issue in Classics and all the Classics professors
and students read both papers, the system assigns small royalties from all of
their accounts to both your account (for the amount you wrote) and to my
account (for the amount I wrote).

The basic idea is that you earn money based on what you create that is useful
to others, and you pay money based on what is useful to you. The amounts are
miniscule with the idea that people who wish to earn money will produce
significant and useful work, whereas those who aren't concerned about earning
money will merely use the work of others and not worry about creating documents
for others to use. Everything is done on a completely individual basis - there
is no need for publishers or anything of the like, although information
providers will spring up. They will gather information and maintain it and make
it easily available in useful formats. However, there's little that an
information provider can do that an individual can't - the scale is the only
limiting factor on the individual.

I see this system as the most equitable method of handling copyright and
royalties. After all, it handles the money issue in that you are always paid
for what you do, and it handles the ownership issue by making sure that you own
what you create. It's theoretically possible for someone to completely copy
something you write and publish it as their own, but (a) you will earn money
from when they copied it, and (b) the system will make it clear that your
version is the original, so it's up to readers to be judicious about choosing
versions in such instances.

Of course the main problem with Xanadu is that it doesn't exist yet, but the
next release date to miss is 1993 in Palo Alto. If you want more information
from Xanadu themselves, their net address is xanadu@xanadu.uucp. It's fairly
likely that something will come of Xanadu eventually since AutoDesk is pouring
money into the Xanadu Operating Company these days. The question is when
they'll finish.

Cheers .... -Adam

Adam C. Engst Editor of TidBITS, the weekly electronic Macintosh journal
ace@tidbits.tcnet.ithaca.ny.us The best way to predict the future
pv9y@crnlvax5, pv9y@vax5.cit.cornell.edu is to invent it. -Alan Kay

(2) --------------------------------------------------------------37----
Date: 08 May 91 23:53:48 EDT
From: George Aichele <73760.1176@CompuServe.COM>
Subject: replaced message re copyright

Resubmitted at the editors' request:

I read with great interest Robin Cover's recent postings regarding copyright,
and I am very sympathetic to his point of view. However, as one who DOES live
in "plainstown.midwest.usa (population 20,000)"--or very near there, anyway--I
note one small difficulty in his proposal. Most of you on this list, I
assume, work at large universities, where access to the networks goes without
saying (and at no direct cost to you personally?). Here in "plainstown,"
believe it or not, there is no public-access node of the Internet or one of
its affiliates. My school does not have access, because it can't afford it.
And CompuServe is definitely not free. Electronic networking is indeed
exciting, but if you want REAL excitement, try paying for it by the minute.
And given all that, the CIS gate to the Internet is email only--no ftp.

So as it stands now (as I understand it) Robin's revolution may reach Bergen
or Hong Kong, but it won't touch those of us here in plainstown. Sorry.

George Aichele
73760.1176@compuserve.com

(3) --------------------------------------------------------------81----
Date: Tue, 07 May 91 22:42:36 CST
From: "Robin C. Cover" <ZRCC1001@SMUVM1>
Subject: COPYRIGHT: METAPHORS FOR INEQUITY AND DYSFUNCTION

Several people have objected to the metaphors used in my copyright postings
to portray the bizarre situation academia has found itself in with respect
to commercial publishers (viz, has created through thoughtlessness and
tolerated through complacency). For those who prefer the language of
economics to political language (revolution) or legal language (extortion),
consider a parallel description by a recognized authority of ARL:

". . .Okerson reviewed the growing dysfunction in scholarly communication
resulting from the imbalance of academe's supply and demand situation:
scholars are both producers and consumers of information, publishers are
primary sellers of information, and universities are both subsidizers and
purchasers of information."

It does not take any advanced training in algebra to see what's imbalanced
in this equation. Throwing property language back into the matrix along
with the publishers' claims to "value-add" the scholar's creation through
refereeing, we have:

SCHOLAR: creator (producer) and user (consumer)
PUBLISHER: authenticator, packager, legal owner, marketeer
UNIVERSITY: subsidizer, purchaser

What? Is this what we want? Neel Smith rightly questions the propriety of
"authenticator" (which is supposed to sweeten the rotten deal). How did
this happen? I could (but won't) expand upon the statement I made that the
publishers are not themselves responsible for this strange state of affairs.
They just exploit it. Academia must shoulder the responsibility for the
dysfunction, and fix the underlying problem. I'm not sure I'm brave enough
to speculate on the irresponsible attitudes and habits of scholarship which
have allowed this situation to lead research libraries to the brink of
financial disaster. Someone tenured and older than I should do that, if it
needs to be done.

Here is the fuller context of Ann Okerson's statement on the crisis of
scholarly communication:

". . .Okerson reviewed the growing dysfunction in scholarly communication
resulting from the imbalance of academe's supply and demand situation:
scholars are both producers and consumers of information, publishers are
primary sellers of information, and universities are both subsidizers and
purchasers of information." That the researcher's reward is usually
<emph>publication</> of the research rather than <emph>payment</> for it,
further complicates the relationship. Okerson supported the continued
pressure on publishers for responsible pricing and the encouragement of
alternatives such as electronic publishing but warned that neither strategy
is likely to break the existing cycle. More fruitful, although more
challenging, is a renewal of the values of the academic community:
responsible collaboration in support of open access to information.
Mechanisms could involve co-ownership of copyright by scholar and
university, refocusing academic reward systems on quality rather than
quantity, more awareness of the dynamics of scholarly publishing on the part
of scholars who are referees and editors, or increased investment in
university presses enabling them to publish much more than their present
10-15% [percent] of scholarly output."

Excerpted from "Crisis in Scholarly Communication Topic of State-Wide
Discussions," by Suzanne Striedieck in _ARL: A Bimonthly Newsletter for
Research Library Issues and Actions_ 155 (March 22, 1991) 8-9.

It is heartening that the ARL has taken aggressive steps to address the
scholarly information/communication crisis precipitated by the economic and
legal realities. For example, the leading "challenge statement" formulated
by the ARL, expressed by from Duane Webster (ARL executive director) in
"Challenges Facing Research Libraries Today," _ARL: A Bimonthly Newsletter
for Research Library Issues and Actions_ 156 (May 8, 1991), 1:

"1. Dramatic increases in the cost, volume and formats of scholarly
information promise to alter radically the traditional structures for
creating, disseminating, and using this fundamental academic resource. This
calls for developing a university-based electronic publishing system;
establishing new partnerships among authors, not-for-profit publishers, and
librarians to ensure the free flow and ready availability of scholarly
information; informing faculty of the causes and the destructive impact of
the continuing price spiral for serial subscriptions; and rethinking the
nature of local investment in information resources."