Allegations on ResearchGate<\/h2>\n
In September, the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical (STM) Publishers formally expressed concerns<\/a> about the ongoing, unauthorized article-sharing policy. They expressed their concerns in a letter and sent it to ResearchGate. The letter requested ResearchGate to implement an automated regulation system for article copyright allocation. This would delineate public\/private sharing seamlessly. ResearchGate, however, rejected the suggestion. Instead, it offered an alternative option for publisher-implemented formal notice provision to their company, termed \u201ctakedown notices\u201d. Accordingly, a group of five publishers called the Coalition for Responsible Sharing (including ACS, Elsevier, Brill, Wiley and Wolters Kluwer) were to send millions of takedown notices.<\/p>\n Since approximately 7 million copyrighted articles were freely available on ResearchGate, the approach seemed impractical. Instead, ACS and Elsevier filed a lawsuit in Germany, asking ResearchGate to clarify its legitimacy to post such content. In the underlying site-process, internet trawling for copyrighted papers proceeded to request researchers to upload modified articles to their ResearchGate portfolio. Clearly, the action warranted that ResearchGate would lose some of its data<\/a> available online or pay for damages at the court proceedings.<\/p>\n In early November, yielding to the pressure from publishing giants, ResearchGate removed at least 1.7 million<\/a>-copyrighted material from its website. Following months of conflict, the change ensures that papers will not be freely available online; instead, they can only be requested directly from authors. It would then be the responsibility of researchers to provide\/deny access to their research article, based on its sharing policy. According to James Milne, spokesperson for the CRS, the decision to remove access to nearly 2 million articles marks a positive first step<\/a>. Additionally, a private sharing network<\/a> may further enhance the security model of article-sharing policies.<\/p>\n The dispute with ResearchGate follows a series of actions by academic publishers against several websites providing access to copyrighted articles. For instance, in 2013, Elsevier sent 2800 takedown<\/a> notices to Academia.edu.\u00a0\u00a0Along with ACS, it jointly filed a lawsuit against Sci-Hub<\/a>. The immense popularity of copyright infringement highlights a bigger problem in the lack of affordable licensing agreements for academic publications. Publishers may need to reach a \u201cfair deal\u201d on subscription costs and open access article models, in the near future.<\/p>\n Other ongoing efforts for open scholarly research include the development of the \u201cFree the Science\u201d<\/a> initiative. This long-term vision driven by The Electrochemical Society aims to bring about a transformative change in scholarly research communication. Further efforts are also underway to develop a novel, non-profit scholarly network known as ScholarlyHub<\/a>. Historian Guy Geltner heads the non-profit scholarly project in an effort to create a portal for academic publications and networking. In contrast to existing academic networks, impending projects will allow academics to own their data in a non-profit scholar-oriented community. In this way, novel approaches to scholarly communication can create a requisite shift\u00a0in the existing paradigm.<\/p>\n What do you think about this move of ResearchGate? Do you agree with the CRS that this step is a great win towards copyright infringement? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.<\/p>\nResearchGate Guilty Of Copyright Infringement<\/h2>\n
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