Fwd: Re: A thought about H.R. 2281

[Adrian Alexander <alexandera@lhl.lib.mo.us>]

Perhaps Chuck Hamaker's question should be re-phrased as follows:

"Do academic authors' institutions, which pay, in large part, for their
research and writing time, get paid for the fruits of their labor? " 

There is a growing perception among academic administrators that their
universities are paying for scholarly information twice (librarians have
known this for a long time). For the individual faculty member,
publication leading to promotion and tenure is usuallyample compensation,
but they aren't the ones paying for the bills, and it's my belief that our
publisher colleagues sometimes overlook that fact. 

Adrian Alexander Big 12 Plus Consortium

>From: "anthony.watkinson" <anthony.watkinson@BTinternet.com>
>To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
>Subject: Re: A thought about H.R. 2281 
>X-edited-by: aokerson@pantheon.yale.edu
>Date: Thu, 25 Jun 1998 19:02:51 EDT
>Reply-To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
>Sender: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
>
>Chuck Hamaker writes - have you asked authors if they have been
>compensated for the articles they have written by tenure and promotion? I
>have never asked that question in that form but in over twenty five years
>in publishing I have never met an academic author of an article who asked
>to be paid. They may be wrong but that is how it is - upsetting to him
>though it may be. I looked him up on AltaVista to see what he wrote. There
>were 300 citations - mostly to the same outpourings admittedly. Does he
>get paid? Has he ever been promoted and were his publications taken into
>account? 
>
>Anthony Watkinson
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Hamaker, Chuck <cahamake@email.uncc.edu>
>To: 'liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu' <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
>Date: 25 June 1998 05:43
>Subject: RE: A thought about H.R. 2281
>
>
>>This particular argument, that scholars don't need to get paid for
>>articles they write since they get tenure, is really amazing.
>>
>>We could just as easily argue that publishers don't need to get paid for
>>articles delivered by document delivery services, since they already got
>>paid the first time they published the article.
>>
>>Telling a producer of something that "someone else, sometime, if you have
>>faith in the system"  will pay you for what you are giving me, isn't
>>economics, it's magic!
>>
>>So, now we have publishers talking about "magic" as justification for not
>>paying authors, nor permitting them any say in how the work they create is
>>distributed past the first publication.
>>
>>I think we've hit a tender point, when rational producers talk with
>>romanticism about where there product comes from.  Have you asked authors
>>if they think they are compensated for their intellectual product through
>>tenure and promotion?
>>
>>P.S. Pat Schroeder, at NASIG last week made the same argument.
>>
>>Self-serving is the nicest thing I can say about a position that says
>>scholars should be in there making sure fair use disappears in the
>>electronic environment, so publishers can exercise more control over the
>>sweat of their brow because someday somewhere, they might get recompensed
>>by somebody else.  hocus pocus.
>>
>>Chuck Hamaker
> 
************************************************
Adrian W. Alexander, Executive Director						      
Big 12 Plus Libraries Consortium	              
Linda Hall Library
5109 Cherry St. 
Kansas City MO  64110-2498
VOICE:	816-926-8765		                                                        
FAX:	816-926-8790 
EMAIL:	AlexanderA@lhl.lib.mo.us