[TYPES] In a letter to the US White House,

[Robert Rand]

I agree with Peter and Gabriel. The ACM seems intent on charging the same
amount per article and just shifting around who pays for it: from readers
to authors to conference-goers to (in their newest scheme) universities as
part of some sort of general tax. And we shouldn't be paying it.

I would add that for publishing conference proceedings, EPTCS (which
publishes the conference proceedings for Linearity, ICLP, QPL and dozens of
other conferences) is a great option. EPTCS is free to everyone, and it
would be nice if more programming languages conferences switched to using
it.

On Sun, Dec 22, 2019 at 12:38 PM <selinger at mathstat.dal.ca> wrote:

> [ The Types Forum, http://lists.seas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/types-list
> ]
>
> I was recently invited to the editorial board of a new ACM journal. I
> refused to become an editor, on the grounds that the journal is not
> open access.
>
> I feel that as editors, we volunteer our time, and I have decided to
> do so only for journals that are truly open access.  And by "open
> access", I do not mean some "gold" model based on author charges
> (currently $1300-$1700 per ACM journal article, see
> https://www.acm.org/publications/openaccess). I mean journals that are
> free for both authors and readers.
>
> There are already many such journals, and they are usually
> community-run. Examples include Logical Methods in Computer Science
> (https://lmcs.episciences.org/), Compositionality
> (https://www.compositionality-journal.org/), and Quantum
> (https://quantum-journal.org/). There is relatively little in the way
> of interested groups of individuals starting new such journals.
>
> I think the best way to get rid of unreasonable publishing models is
> not to participate in them.
>
> -- Peter
>
> Jonathan Aldrich wrote:
> >
> >
> > [ The Types Forum,
> http://lists.seas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/types-list ]
> >
> > I agree with Gabriel.  Furthermore, I think we should do something.
> >
> > On Fri, Dec 20, 2019 at 8:54 AM Gabriel Scherer <
> gabriel.scherer at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > [ The Types Forum,
> http://lists.seas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/types-list
> > > ]
> > >
> > > Dear types-list and SIGPLAN,
> > >
> > > I have long been of the opinion that our scientific publications
> > > should be Open Access, and that editors should not request more than
> > > a fair price (cost of publication, which Dasgtuhl estimates at $60
> > > per article). In particular, I believe that copyright transfer
> > > agreements, as imposed by most editors including the ACM, is deeply
> > > unethical: the publishers are not the authors of our scientific
> > > production and they should not force us to give our copyright to
> > > them. A non-exclusive publishing agreement should be enough.
> > >
> > > Whether or not you agree with this position, you may be interested in
> > > the content of the following letter to the US White House that
> > > a coalition of scientific publishers, *including the ACM*, signed and
> > > support.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> https://presspage-production-content.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/1508/coalitionletteropposinglowerembargoes12.18.2019-581369.pdf
> > >   press release from the coalition of editors:
> > >
> > >
> https://newsroom.publishers.org/researchers-and-publishers-oppose-immediate-free-distribution-of-peer-reviewed-journal-articles
> > >
> > > (This letter was written in the context of a proposed US legislation
> > > to force more scientists to publish their work in Fair Open Access
> > > venues. I haven't been able to find a precise link to a discussion of
> > > this proposed legislation.)
> > >
> > > The following parts of the letter co-signed by the ACM are
> > > particularly juicy:
> > >
> > > > [We] have learned that the Administration may be preparing to step
> > > > into the private marketplace and force the immediate free
> distribution
> > > > of journal articles financed and published by organizations in the
> > > > private sector, including many non-profits. This would effectively
> > > > nationalize the valuable American intellectual property that we
> > > > produce and force us to give it away to the rest of the world for
> > > > free.
> > >
> > > > This mandate [...] would make it very difficult for most American
> > > > publishers to invest in publishing these articles. As a consequence,
> > > > it would place increased financial responsibility on the government
> > > > through diverted federal research grant funds or additional monies
> > > > to underwrite the important value added by publishing. In the coming
> > > > years, this cost shift would place billions of dollars of new and
> > > > additional burden on taxpayers.
> > >
> > > In my discussion with many of us, I regularly hear that the ACM is
> > > "not evil" (the SIGPLAN, of course, is pure good!) and that placating
> > > its weird views (for example, that it really does cost $700 or $900 to
> > > publish an article as Open Source) is good for our research
> > > community. It do not see how this argument is compatible with the ACM
> > > signing this letter.
> > >
> > > I believe that many of our activities, which we collectively trained
> > > ourselves to see as harmless administrative details of our research
> > > work, are in fact empowering the ACM to make those claims. Should we
> > > accept to give away our copyright, or pay¹ unreasonable
> > > Gold Access author processing charges (APCs)?
> > >
> > > ¹: The SIGPLAN decision to cover APC costs for PACMPL articles is
> > > shielding many of us from paying APCs. But many of the smaller
> > > conferences, symposiums or workshops in our community whose
> > > proceedings are handled by the ACM are still limited to "pay
> > > $900" (or "pay $25 per page") as the only Open Access option, with
> > > copyright transfer as the only free choice, which is effectively
> > > keeping those proceedings Closed-Access.
> > >
> >
> >
>
>