[JoPP-Public] JoPP-Public Digest, Vol 63, Issue 17

Sat Aug 19 17:51:22 CEST 2017

Andreas Wittel <andreas.wittel at gmail.com> writes:

> I am not an expert on copyright, but feel strongly about some implications
> of what we are discussing. To outline briefly my politics: As a Marxist, I
> am all for open access, but find some of the free culture positions rather
> problematic, particularly those ones that are rooted in liberal theory
> (Stallman, Lessig, Benkler etc).
>
> One of these positions is the idea that academic should not only make
> available their work for free, but also make it available in a format does
> not respect authors rights in that it does not care about attribution. In a
> neoliberal climate that massively devalues academic labour it is not a wise
> strategy to devalue academic labour even further and to do so voluntarily.
> Therefore I do not support copyright politics, that contribute to new
> levels of proletaristion of academic  labour.
>
> But this is not just about politics, it also about the future orientation
> of this journal. I would be very hesitant to publish in a journal that
> invites and encourages the use of my labour without appropriation. And I
> have a feeling I am not the only academic with such a view. So to go for
> PD, and for that matter for CC0 has imho the long-term effect that
> academics will stay away from JOPP and that the reputation of JOPP as a
> journal with high-quality academic rigour could seriously suffer.
>
> My preference would be CC-BY-SA

Heh, I would argue for CC0 for similar reasons that Andreas argues for
CC-BY-SA. I don't think academics today have to (or empirical are)
relying on the copyright regime to enforce attribution (BY) or the
misrepresentation of their work (SA) -- these are tools that publishers
use to extort money from academics and other consumers. Academics have
their own culture, ethics and even legal regulations to address problems
of non-attribution (e.g. plagiarism) and misrepresentation (for instance
straw man arguments), and these should be adequate to address the
matter. I would use CC0 simply to ensure that the journal content is
available to readers without relying on the copyright regime as little
as possible. To summarise: I argue that respect for and enforcement of
IP rights contributes to the proletarisation of academic labour much
more than defends against it. Therefore, we should dismantle it.

I also agree with Stefan Meretz that our PD/CC0 policy is one of the
things that sets JoPP apart from other open access journals, which buy
into the more restrictive and more pro-IP regimes offered by Creative
Commons. So far I was very happy to explore an alternative path based on
trying to have as less restrictions as legally possible. As Zack
mentions, there are already plenty of other journals who are working
with more restrictive licences.

Parts of my articles have been cut up and published in fanzines, mostly
with attribution as a courtesy, but sometimes without. Sometimes
fanzines are sold for a price and profits go to the publisher. Do I
mind? No, my livelyhood is not dependent on how many people credit me,
except citations in academic publications, which are, again, governed by
scientific norms and not IP law. What I care about is that the material
is available for read and reuse.

I think the subtle shift from an informal PD dedication to the formal
application of CC0 would be sufficient to clarify the questions about
author rights that are necessary for JoPP to be listed as Open Access. I
prefer this solution, rather than imposing more terms for conformity's
sake, or in hopes that the IP regime would serve the interest of
authors. Sorry to chime in late too, and make the discussion more
difficult.

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maxigas, kiberpunk
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