Training in licensing electronic resources

Here’s a course coming up in September for those looking for an introduction to the licensing of electronic resources.

Licences and their Negotiation
To be held in : The City Suite, Thistle City Hotel, Barbican, London, EC1V 8DS
24th September 2009, 9.30-16.30

Course Outline
This practical one day training event is designed to provide Information Professionals with an introduction to the licensing of electronic resources such as e books, e journals and abstracting and indexing services. This course has been designed to introduce the major components of such licences and why they are important, what are the issues that are likely to cause the greatest difficulty, and will introduce issues related to the fine art of negotiating.

Click here for more details on the UKeiG website.

Curation and consent. How much is too much?

I’m researching a DCC Legal Watch Paper at the moment, focussing on consent in research (looking at both the legal and the ethical angles). I have been thinking about all this from a curation perspective. With the potential for reuse of resources or data being an important goal in terms of curation, a key question arises which is:

“What use of their data did the participant consent to?”

The answer to this question has a massive bearing on the useability of that data down the line.

So, for example, did the participant consent to:

1. only use A (by researcher A); or
   
2. use A but by any researcher; or
   
3. use A (by researcher A) and use B (by researcher B); or
   
4. researcher A transferring the data to researcher B (crucial if option 3 is to be of any practical use and only researcher A has the data); or
   
5. use of their data by anyone for any purposes.

Of course, some of the answers could be found in the wording of the consent form (N.B. consent is rarely required by law to be in writing but it is still very wise to secure it that way) but my question is about the picture behind it and the legal and ethical appropriateness of what is written in that form – as well as the effectiveness of that consent for enabling scientific progress.

In an era of open approaches to data, the idea of global consent is quite appealing. It ensures that useful data remains useable (IP and contract considerations aside) and ‘open’. But consenting to any use of your personal data...? It has been said that one of the best things about making data open is the things that will be done with it and created by other researchers that you simply would never have thought of. But when it comes to your personal data (i.e. data about you, that identifies you) are you happy to give consent for it to be used in ways you have never imagined? The answer to this may be yes or no, and I would love to hear your thoughts.

Aside from personal feelings on this matter, would such a wide consent be considered legal? Would it be ethical?

What do you think?

Open Innovation & Intellectual Property

There will be what looks to be a great event taking place in London in a few weeks time. I’ll be in sunny Italy (tough life) but if I wasn’t I’d definitely be there.

The event is called Open Innovation and Intellectual Property and takes place on Friday15th May at NESTA offices in the City from 1pm.

The description from NESTA is as follows:

“NESTA, The Wellcome Trust and the Creative Commons is jointly hosting a conference to explore how Commons tools can unlock innovation by making it easier for artists, scientists, researchers and businesses to share, collaborate and build on the work of others. Much innovation today is hampered by a lack of access to existing data, content and facilities. In sectors such as biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, a lack of openness leads to duplication of existing research activities and significant effort down blind allies. In the creative industries, the absence of simple, standardised licensing arrangements which establish usage rights is holding back innovative online business models. Yet it is sectors such as biotechnology and the creative industries which are otherwise best placed to lead the UK out of recession.

One solution is the adoption of the ‘Commons’ model of intellectual property. The commercial and wider social benefits of using the Commons model to address the barriers to sharing are potentially huge. It is estimated, for example, that there are already 130 million Creative Commons licensed works in the world, an over six-fold increase since 2005. And large numbers of service providers are appearing with new business models to "lubricate" the Commons marketplace for knowledge, services and resources.

NESTA’s conference will explore the impact of the Creative Commons to date, and debate its strengths and weaknesses as a model for supporting innovation. In science, the case of the health sector may be particularly compelling: under traditional drug development models, a well-funded research group starting today has a slim chance at getting a drug to market by 2025. Can a Health Commons speeden up drug discovery? In the creative industries, film, games and music businesses point to the way intellectual property rights are managed as a barrier to innovation. Can more widespread adoption of Creative Commons licenses support new business models for the sector?”

Speakers include:

• James Boyle (Creative Commons)
• John Wilbanks (Science Commons)
• David Lammy (IP Minister)
• Sir John Sulston (Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation)
• Tony Wood (Pfizer)
• Iain Wilcocks (Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property)
• Richard Mollet (British Phonographic Industry)

If you go, please do let me know anything interesting that comes up! :-)

DCC Legal Watch Paper on Science Commons

Hello all,

Long time no speak. I’ve not been around for a while and in my absence have neglected to tell you that the DCC Science Commons Legal Watch Paper I mentioned was published back at the beginning of March.

If you’re interested, you can take a read here.

Feedback always welcome!

Making FOI requests easy (plus people power!)

Some time ago I mentioned the development by mysociety.org of a new site to help people make Freedom of Information (FOI) requests from different parts of government.

Well its called WhatDoTheyKnow? …and here it is!

mysociety.org is doing the internet rounds today because their site TheyWorkForYou was instrumental in the cancellation of the vote on exempting details of MP’s expenses from the FOI Act.

So if making FOI queries is something you’re interested in, this site will make it very easy for you.

The site also archives the responses on the web for others to use. A good example of data curation!

...and a Happy New Year!

I'd like to wish a happy, healthy and peaceful 2009 to everyone out there. Make it a good one!

Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nebarnix/854348966/in/set-72157594248654650/ BY-NC-ND

Radical sharing - Science Commons

A bit slow off the mark with this one but thanks for conference contributions also go to John Wilbanks for a fascinating talk on ‘radical sharing’.

Chris Rusbridge has already given a good overview of the talk on the Digital Curation Blog, so I will just mention a few highlights for me. A couple of the really helpful bits were the analogies he used when describing the operation of copyright in the digital world.

The first was a container and its contents. You can think of copyright as protecting the container but not the contents of the container. This is how copyright has long operated (it doesn’t protect ideas but the expression of those ideas). However, some of the licences users are forced to agree to lock that container. So although the copyright still operates in the same way access to the contents is reduced (in this case by contract). Open Access solves the legal problem but not the container problem.

The second analogy was helpful in explaining the differences in the way journals/books can be used now when they are (often) electronic as opposed to paper based. He compared this to the difference between buying and renting a house.

When you buy a paper based copy it is a hard copy and it is your hard copy. You are free to do what you like with it. This is like owning a house. Now that many publications are electronic it’s more similar to the renting/lease model. You can still read the publication (live in the house) but as with renting you are regulated by a contract which will add further conditions/limitations.

A further useful point that he highlighted is that using copyleft or sharealike in the data world actually hinders freedom. If two datasets with two different licences both based on copyleft or share alike (i.e requiring resulting works to be distributed under same terms) are used, when someone integrates that data and wants to put a licence on the resulting data they would be stuck because both licences insist the resulting data be made available under a particular licence. Thus, they can’t distribute that data without breaking the terms of one of the licences. Copyleft may work within communities where there is consensus on licensing terms but if the aim is to make it available outside that community it presents difficulties.

An example he gave of this was WikiPathways who just changed their licence terms from containing a share-alike condition to CC-BY. They’ve given up their right to sue but have given info to the world. They reward people who follow their intention with use of a trademark and ignore the people who don’t. The opposite way round from what we have come to expect.

John talked more about the approach of the Science Commons project to data sharing. I’m not going to go into this further here as it will be covered in the DCC Science Commons Legal Watch Paper in the New Year. I will however mention two of his other comments.

Firstly, that people are reluctant to share their data because they are worried someone else might muck it up. But it may not have occurred to them that someone else might do something brilliant with it. Something different from their emphasis, that they would not have done.

Secondly, looking back through history it can be seen that it is not unnatural to be in the position these advocates of openness find themselves in. Dislodging entrenched processes is hard work and stable systems are resistant to change on multiple levels. If this is to be the way ahead it will take some great effort to make it work and require voluntary action on the part of many.

One final thought - it occurred to me how often it is a contractual issue rather than a strict IP issue causing difficulty here. Although it is often the case (and correct me if you feel I’m wrong) that the contracts are made to seem more reasonable (and therefore more readily agreed to) through a misunderstanding/overstatement of the IP rights that actually exist.