There is a stark digital divide when it comes to access to the latest scholarly articles. Students and professors at most universities have unlimited access to large scholarship collections such as JSTOR and his HeinOnline because their institution subscribes to a site license. But for others, these and many other scholarly publications are either locked or cannot be read without paying a hefty fee per article.
Peter Baldwin, a history professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, calls this a “grotesque divide,” but many professors don’t realize it. After all, they’re spoiled for easy access to scholarships, and as soon as a student graduates and leaves the campus, it’s like being kicked out of the digital paradise of the college world into a dark, inaccessible place. We forget that it is a thing. world. “
There is a longstanding call for scholarships to be free for all, known as the open access movement. Baldwin argues that this time, with AI and ChatGPT reshaping information, could be a tipping point that accelerates the movement to open the door to scholarship.
Baldwin’s latest book, Athena Unbound: Why and How Scalely Knowledge Should Be Free for All, examines the history and future of the open access movement. And, fittingly, his publisher made a version of the book available online for free.
This professor does not claim that all information should be free. He focuses on freeing scholarships earned by people who have full-time jobs in college and don’t expect to make a living from writing. In fact, the whole idea of scholarly research is that other scholars build on someone else’s ideas, or from the work of other scholars, that we may be heading down a dead-end path. He argues that research depends on it being freely shared so that it can be verified.
A typical open access model makes scholarly articles freely available by charging authors a fee to publish their articles in the journal. And, in some cases, the fees are often paid by university libraries, and this poses new kinds of challenges as not all scholars in all disciplines receive equal support.
The number of open access journals has increased over the years. However, according to recent estimates, the majority of academic journals still follow the traditional subscription model.
Edsurge recently got in touch with Baldwin to talk about how he sees the movement going.
Listen to episodes on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you can get podcasts, or use the player on this page. Or read the partial transcript below, lightly edited for clarity.
EdSurge: How would you describe the current state of the open access publishing movement?
Peter Baldwin: We are clearly heading in the right direction, but the speed at which we get there varies greatly depending on the type of content we are talking about. So for science like physics, mathematics, computer science, it basically works online.they are basically [post and comment on free pre-prints]. In a way, they effectively solved the problem themselves. That doesn’t mean magazines don’t exist yet. For example, regarding mathematics journals, I was just recently told by a prominent mathematician: He said, “Yes, no, of course no one read the diary, but the diary is still there.”
They exist primarily because they are used to validate hiring decisions. In other words, publication in the most prestigious mathematics journals shapes a mathematics career and thus validates your application in the job market.But no one actually reads the print version [because they saw the pre-print].
If universities simply decouple their promotion, tenure, and hiring decisions from the prestige hierarchy of journals, they may put journals out of business altogether, as long as they display prestige.
So this is happening in some areas but not in others. How will that change and become more open access in the humanities?
One of the big things moving us in this direction is the change in copyright law. I don’t think it will happen anytime soon. Because the interests are so confusing, mixed, and conflicting that it’s nearly impossible to put together a coalition that supports major copyright reform.But what we need is a shorter term. [that a work is covered by copyright]At least when it comes to scientific research and its results.
Now, copyright law has been extended to this point. Initially, from his late 18th century, when copyright law was first enacted, to his early 19th century, this period was about his 14 years, after which it was sometimes renewable. So 14 years later, it’s officially in the public domain. This makes the author’s life plus 70 years. So well over a century old. And that makes it an object of contention. That’s why publishers won’t give it up. Because publishers have this kind of profiteering that allows us to own intellectual property much more effectively than property rights to homes and other things we own. . It’s practically permanent ownership that they have.
The reality, of course, is that the vast majority of books have no commercial value six months after publication, yet remain locked up by copyright law for a century. It makes no sense. It would be much better to say let’s give it a 2 or 3 year commercial value. After a few years, most books are no longer bought. And for the small number of works that are being acquired, they should, of course, retain copyright so publishers and authors can make money from it. That’s good. But that vast amount no longer has commercial value in any form. And it should be free. In fact, there’s no reason not to make this free so people can read it for free.
What should I do? Is there a system in which if a book doesn’t earn his X yen in two years, it’s in the public domain?
something like that. Then let’s say it suddenly started downloading like crazy and went viral. In that case, it should be the publisher’s and author’s right to take it out of the public domain and publish a new edition or something. I mean, I’m all for people who have something of commercial value and make money off it. I believe that anything that is trapped there and cannot be used should be released. Because it is good to be set free. There is no downside to this as no one loses anything. No one loses readership, income, or royalties.
There is a lot of talk about ChatGPT and other AI systems right now. What impact do you think that has had on the movement for open access scholarships?
I have two things to say about ChatGPT. First, American copyright law does not recognize copyrights other than those written by humans. If that’s true, and it means that nothing ChatGPT produces is actually copyrightable, then this could blow the bottom of the copyright system. Because what’s the point of copywriting when 80% of content is no longer copyrighted? People will ignore it because it can, or it can do an equally good job of getting around copyright issues. So it could completely shake up the entire copyright system.
The second point is that ChatGPT, from what I understand at the moment, scrapes and feeds the junk of the web. Anything you can get into is fine, but it doesn’t feed on the good stuff on the web. As far as I know, I doubt it can cross the paywall into academic databases or journals. As far as that’s true, all we’re getting is a garbage-in, garbage-out product from ChatGPT, and as long as we really want ChatGPT to help us, we need to allow access.To [scholarship].
So, in a way, open access is the key to making ChatGPT work. Because a good ChatGPT should be based on what is currently hindered by paywalls.
What’s the point of having an incredibly powerful tool that only feeds you garbage when you can have an incredibly powerful tool that really knows what information is out there? Huh? Perhaps anyone interested in ChatGPT will also be an open access advocate because they want ChatGPT to incorporate the best of the Web as well.
It sounds like you want to build a custom product that feeds AI tools like ChatGPT. So maybe each discipline will have its own research chatbot or something?
Well, Wikipedia, for example, is exploring the idea of creating a chat wiki, essentially sourced exclusively from Wikipedia. On Wikipedia, at least the information has gone through a vetted process and isn’t just a bilge.
I have to ask about copyright infringement, as there are still large collections offering free versions of scholarly articles that violate copyright. How does this affect legal open access efforts?
Piracy is the open access movement’s best friend, but of course you can’t say that in a polite way. While saying that it certainly puts the publisher on its feet, we have to record a kind of disapproving rant.
Twenty years ago, we can look back to the web’s cowboy days. At that time, there were sites like Megaupload, Pirate Bay, and sites that basically had commercial content like pop music and popular movies. [and offered illegal copies for download]. It was all regulated by international regulations and national cooperation. Basically they were closed and what do we have now? We have Spotify, Apple Music, and Netflix. It’s obviously not open access, but it’s an affordable and fairly open access format. If you pay $13 a month for Amazon Prime, I think you get 15,000 movies and TV shows. As a lending library, this isn’t a bad model. And clearly, most of the public has decided that they are willing to pay a reasonable price for reasonable access to large amounts of good stuff.
In the academic world, there are sites that people visit to acquire academic knowledge. In some cases, it’s just a nuisance, because it’s funding the Russians to allow them to poke their noses into the Western publishing industry. They may be funded through donations or voluntary donations. These problems exist because the publishing industry simply has not been able to work together to offer content at a fair price.
