
NASA paywalls first papers arising from Curiosity rover – I am setting them free - rflrob
http://www.michaeleisen.org/blog/?p=1430
======
javajosh
Actually, the real question is why the raw data isn't free.

Note: I worked briefly as a contractor at JPL in 2011 on a project related to
Curiosity image-processing and distribution (among other things).

I argued at the time (fairly strenuously) that the raw data (the data that was
used by the scientists in this paper) should be public.

The reason the data is not released immediately to the public is both
understandable and frustrating: scientists around the world compete for
control of Curiosity's precious mission time. The mission is refreshed every
day, each move is voted on and the results uploaded to the rover. The data is
not released to give the "winning" scientists first crack at interpreting the
data. It's about _prestige_ \- if you released the data and get "scooped" by
Joe Public it's embarrassing but it's also a lost opportunity for scientific
prestige.

The same basic reasoning is why so many JPL-produced datasets (particularly
astronomical but also terrestrial - JPL does a lot of weather research) are
not public.

Personally, I'd like to see this change. I want all publicly-funded non-
military research projects have an open data policy. Clearly this would not
apply to research with straight-up defense applications. But Mars rover data?
I suspect that scientists will be incentivized without being granted
artificial monopolies on that data.

~~~
madaxe
Prestige? _Prestige?_

Science is not about prestige. It's about science. If you want prestige, go
become a jockey, or the world's best hooker. Too many "scientists" are in it
for the holidays, money, and "prestige", rather than the, y'know, _SCIENCE_.

I'm afraid it's not "understandable", it's nasty, selfish, and contrary to
scientific advancement.

By not releasing data, they're preventing the internet hivemind from doing its
thing - and it has managed some pretty impressive things (NEAR target
spotting, anyone?).

~~~
tlarkworthy
well we don't get paid jack. 99.9 % of the science undertook is boring,
inconclusive or negative results.

The only carrot _is_ prestige, and the only perks are holidays ...

I dunno why you suggested money because there is none (in wages).

I expect a big reason for not releasing the data is ... who is gonna do the
necessary steps to release the data? You want to take a scientist off his role
to build a website and database?? We have little administrative support
(probably JPL has better, but still, yet another distraction that eats time
from our main job that pays too little). The people that make websites for a
living get paid better the scientists, so its a bit harsh to expect scientists
to constantly be building website to share data whilst paying them under the
industry norms.

~~~
danesparza
In his article, the OP mentions "$2.5 billion taxpayer dollars that made it
possible". Sorry you don't get paid as much as you'd like -- that doesn't give
you the moral high ground. Doing it for "prestige" still isn't a good reason.

At a cost of 2.5 billion, I don't think it's too harsh to expect a small
budget for releasing the data publicly.

~~~
barry-cotter
I sympathise with your goals but you're being a douche. Science is a crap
career if you're chasing money. You're a smart college graduate with excellent
grades who spends 4-7 years doing an apprenticeship for piss poor money, then
a postdoc, for three years, maybe a second postdoc, and if you're lucky you
then get a tenure track position. Now you have seven years of earning high
school teacher money but working 60-80 hours a week and at the end of it
there's an excellent chance you'll be fired.

People do science for love or glory, not money. (Except people from 2nd or 3rd
world countries studying or postdocing in industrial nations. For them it's a
sweet deal.)

~~~
pm90
_(Except people from 2nd or 3rd world countries studying or postdocing in
industrial nations. For them it 's a sweet deal.)_

Reminded me of this
article:[http://wuphys.wustl.edu/~katz/scientist.html](http://wuphys.wustl.edu/~katz/scientist.html)

------
tzs
His assumption that these works must be public domain is questionable. It is
true that US government works are generally not subject to copyright in the
US, but that is when they are works of government employees producing the
works within the scope of their employment.

There are two big limitations on this. First, if the government work
incorporates outside copyrighted work, only the parts authored by the
government employee operating within the scope of his employment are public
domain.

Second, this only applies to government employees. It does NOT apply to
contractors. What happens with copyright of works produced by contractors
under a government contract is determined by the terms of the contract.

The Curiosity project is largely run at JPL. JPL is managed for NASA by
Caltech. Almost all JPL employees are neither government employees nor
government contractors. They are Caltech employees.

To figure out the copyright status of works authored by JPL employees, we'd
need to look at their employment contract with Caltech, and with Caltech's
contract with NASA.

~~~
simonster
Also, the journal publisher definitely owns the page layout, and can
potentially claim copyright to the final text, since its editors contributed
to it during the review process.

~~~
kbutler
The publisher "owns" the layout only for the creative expression within the
page layout. There's not likely to be much copyrightable expression within a
page layout. And infringement of that expression by republishing the article
is likely to meet the criteria for fair use.

Editorial contributions are also unlikely to rise to the measure of a
separately copyrightable work. In the case of scientific articles, joint
authorship between contributing scientists is common, but the editors of the
journal are never (rarely?) cited as authors. Occasionally, a reviewer will
make substantive contributions to the science and join as a co-author.

It seems pretty safe to say that if the editor is not listed as a co-author of
the paper, neither the author(s) nor the editor(s) consider it a "joint work".

See also
[http://lottfischer.com/general.php?category=Resources&subhea...](http://lottfischer.com/general.php?category=Resources&subhead=Articles&headline=+When+does+an+Editor%E2%80%99s+input+create+a+Joint+Work+of+Authorship)
for a discussion of when the editing could arise (basically, if both the
author and the editor intend for it to be a work of joint authorship.)

~~~
simonster
I don't know enough about the relevant case law to tell you for certain that
the layout is copyrightable, but my gut feeling is that it is, since that bar
is pretty low and copying the publisher's PDF seems kind of analogous to
copying a website's HTML. Fair use may not be applicable here, since even
though the layout is a small proportion of the total work, it has value
independent of the text: People might spend money (or persuade their
university to spend money) to buy the publisher's PDF even if the manuscript
were available for free. Given your link I agree that the review process is
unlikely to give the publisher any claim to the text itself.

I do know that most author agreements for non-open access journals allow
authors to publish the manuscript on their personal website and in
repositories (sometimes pre-review, sometimes post-review), but most do not
allow authors to publish the publisher's PDF, which suggests that the
publishers believe they have some kind of ownership over the latter. (In
practice many people post the publisher's PDF articles on their websites and
no one complains, although repositories like PubMed Central contain only
manuscripts from these journals.)

The AAAS author agreement actually explicitly allows authors to legally
publish the peer reviewed manuscript on their websites as soon as it is
published, which raises the question of why the authors of these studies
didn't just do that.

------
eliteraspberrie
Not everything remotely related to the MSL mission is performed by NASA or US
government employees. Non-US scientists cannot be employed directly by NASA
due to citizenship requirements. NASA avoids cutting itself off from the world
scientific community as a result by granting contract work to, or simply
cooperating with, non-US scientists.

Indeed, some of the work "freed" here was performed by European scientists,
using NASA data -- which is available to the public in the US and out -- but
without a penny of US government funding. These works are certainly not in the
public domain.

Most scientists would be happy to share their research. Just ask.

~~~
devindotcom
Yes, a quick review of the papers shows what you say - the authors belong to a
plethora of institutes and centers, American and otherwise.

NASA got the data and has made it available, yes? Further work using it is
being done by third (fourth, fifth...) parties who feel their work would be
most visible in a top-shelf journal like Science.

I'm all for liberation of data, and for scientific papers in particular having
wide and free dissemination. We should really be working on alternative
funding models for research and alternative business models for journals
rather than calling out individual teams for putting their work where they
think it will receive the most attention.

~~~
mturmon
Yes, the data is free. One link for the calibrated data is:

[http://pds.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/subscription_service/SS-201306...](http://pds.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/subscription_service/SS-20130610.shtml)

If you really wanted to work with the data, you'd want to get in touch with
the instrument team. At this relatively early stage, there will be quirks that
will not be corrected for/documented. Poking around with the data is fine, but
you might spend a lot of time on something that is a known instrumental
artifact.

One caveat with this "free" data -- usually there is an embargo period (there
was with MSL, something like 90 days). During that first 90 days, a few
hundred people came to be resident at JPL where the mission is controlled.
They all worked in a few large rooms there, largely on Mars time. So the first
batch of papers (some of which are already published) are done by the
instrument teams. And this is clearly not a level playing field. (The thing
is, those teams worked hard on a lot of un-fun calibration and infrastructure-
building.)

Other missions have much longer embargo periods (years in some cases), and
some have effectively no embargo at all. It's partly about the culture of the
discipline.

------
unreal37
The problem with vigilante justice is, the vigilante usually gets the wrong
person.

These scientists don't work for NASA, most of them work for private institutes
and some are based in Europe, the work is entitled to be copyrighted, and
basically you're stealing it and giving it away for free.

I love science, I love space, I think Nasa's budget should be tripled (at the
expense of a few less fighter jets). But these scientists didn't do anything
wrong by publishing THEIR works (not Public Domain works) behind a pay wall.

Let's get the facts straight at least.

~~~
ggchappell
> These scientists don't work for NASA, most of them work for private
> institutes and some are based in Europe, ...

Yes. Also Canada.

> ... the work is entitled to be copyrighted, ...

You're heading in the right direction here, but copyright does not work quite
that way in the modern world. No one _copyrights_ (verb) things anymore.
Rather, copyright exists in most works upon their creation. So, yes, these are
copyrighted works. (And so is your HN comment, by the way.)

> ... and basically you're stealing it and giving it away for free.

The scientists already gave it away to the journal for free. Journals, which
provide nothing in the modern world except prestige, now hold the copyright
and charge for access. No one is stealing anything, since everyone who had a
copy before still has a copy. Yes, the papers are now being given away free to
the public, probably against the wishes of the copyright holder (the journal).

> But these scientists didn't do anything wrong by publishing THEIR works (not
> Public Domain works) behind a pay wall.

Close. The scientists assigned the copyright to the journal, for no payment
(but for the prestige of it). The journal is the one publishing behind a
paywall, and the journal is the one getting any money collected.

Now, to the real point: "wrong" is not the same as "illegal". Yes, the journal
holds the copyright to the paper, and it is legally entitled to charge for
access. But what about the moral issue? _I_ funded this work. Me. My taxes
paid for it. If you are a U.S. taxpayer, then you paid for it, too. And yet
now I'm supposed to pay to see it? There's a problem there.

This _would_ be illegal[1] if these guys were medical researchers funded by
the NIH, which has a policy that publications coming out of projects they fund
must be freely accessible.[2] It is not illegal here; I think it should be.

And one more thing that many people don't catch: the researchers would
probably love to have their papers more accessible. They are not sending
papers to pay-walled journals because they like limited access. They are doing
it because these are the journals that give them prestigious publications. The
journals can trade on their prestige to enforce conditions on the researchers,
like limited access. _No_ _one_ likes this except the journals. If NASA made a
policy that papers from their projects must be made freely available, then the
journals would either have to allow it, or else stop publishing all NASA-based
works. Experience strongly suggests that they would do the former.

[EDIT--One more quick note before the editing period closes: It appears the
author of the post might not be clear on the distinction between researchers
working on NASA projects and researchers doing projects using data that NASA
has made available for anyone to use. I am primarily addressing the former
situation here. However, what I said about the journals being the only ones
with any interest in limited access, applies to academic researchers in
general.]

[1] Or maybe not quite _illegal_ , but rather _against_ _regulations_. Almost
but not quite the same thing.

[2] [http://publicaccess.nih.gov/](http://publicaccess.nih.gov/)

~~~
jonnydark
It's not just prestige though, it's also legitimacy. Scientific journals have
formal peer review and it is this process that is supposed to ensure that
papers that get published aren't totally spurious. One might argue that NASA
could be exempt from this process given its own reputation and level of
accountability, but submitting articles to journals for peer review and
publication is standard scientific practice.

The paywall is arguably just for business though, a lot of papers get put up
on sites like arxiv pre-publication anyway.

I don't see much in the argument from the view of the taxpayer though. In the
UK a lot of public funding goes in to research and the papers are largely
behind paywalls - Graphene research for example. Now, if we had government
subsidized peer review journals - I could definitely get behind that.

~~~
betterunix
"Scientific journals have formal peer review and it is this process that is
supposed to ensure that papers that get published aren't totally spurious"

Considering the fact that peer review is done by _volunteers_ , I think this a
pretty weak argument. At best you could argue that the publishers are
organizing the review process, but even that is suspect -- scientists organize
themselves pretty well.

Peer review is orthogonal to copyright issues. Journal publishers serve almost
no purpose in the modern world, and the copyrights they hold on scientific
articles are doing more to prevent the dissemination of knowledge than to
promote scientific research.

~~~
czr80
This seems to prove too much. Either all scientists are irrational, or they
get some real value out of the journals system.

~~~
betterunix
The only value a scientist gets from publishing a journal article is another
publication they can add to their CV. A long list of publications is important
for any scientist who wants to get funding, and even grad students need to
have that long list of publications on their CV if they hope to get a research
job later in life. What the journal provides is its _name_ , and nothing else
-- because as I said, everything else that goes into a journal is done by
volunteers.

Now, once upon a time, journals served a secondary purpose, which was to
distribute scientific results on a global scale. Back then, there was no
Internet, and printing enough copies of a journal to satisfy the world's needs
required industrial equipment. _Fortunately those days are done and over with_
, but unfortunately we are still dealing with the relics of that bygone age in
the form of academic publishing companies. Worse, in fact, since today's
publishers are far greedier and for more profiteering than many of the
publishers of the past.

Really, were it not for copyright, we could cut publishers out of the equation
without any ill effects and have a net gain for society by removing all
paywalls from scientific articles.

------
lelandbatey
Well, I hope this doesn't come back and bite me too badly :l

I've mirrored the files here in case the original author decides to take them
down:

[http://lelandbatey.com/science/](http://lelandbatey.com/science/)

~~~
belorn
Good. It really is up to the publication to prove that they hold the
copyright.

By providing mirrors, it spreads the work further for the authors, lowering
the chance that they would add their support to take it down.

------
kartikkumar
I am pursuing a PhD in the field of planetary sciences at the moment, and I
can definitely vouch for the fact that there is a lot of discussion amongst
the "younger folks" about the elistism of science, particularly for missions
like Curiosity. The last few conferences I've been to (Division on Planetary
Sciences, European Planetary Science Congress, American Geophysical Union Fall
Meeting) have highlighted how worried publishers like Elsevier are about the
changing attitudes in the field. I've been to a number of dedicated PR
seminars at these conferences, where it is clear that the pitch is that
publishers that require payment for the publication of scientific papers are
not preventing taxpayers from gaining access to results, but are rather simply
seeking appropriate compensation for their efforts in coordinating peer-review
processes and bringing the results to the attention of the wider community.

I very openly tell my colleagues that change is necessary to make it clear
that investment in missions like MSL, MESSENGER, JUICE etc. is for the mutual
benefit of everyone. I think as a scientist, I have an OBLIGATION to
communicate my results to those that make my work possible.

Open access journals are making some headway, but unfortunately, until the
bigwigs in the field really make a clear statement of intent to shift from the
traditional publishing houses to these new publishers, the status quo will be
maintained.

I applaud the OP's efforts to make these results accessible to to everyone,
and sincerely hope that there are no legal repercussions.

------
dmlorenzetti
I work at a National Lab, and all my publications are available for free.
However, that's not done through the website of the publishing journal, it's
done through my Lab's portal.

The main requirement journals have is that we don't distribute the journal's
marked-up final version. So we make them available as "Lab Reports" with our
own typesetting, front cover, and so on.

~~~
mzs
Exactly, the first one via a simple google search on the first author's name:

[http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2013/pdf/1685.pdf](http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2013/pdf/1685.pdf)

So it is a conference paper, freely available now too. Looking that over, it
seems it's that typical short dense sort. Conferences tend to limit the length
of papers. Science being more general interest, I would expect that paper to
have more prose, background info, and images.

------
coldcode
The American taxpayer paid for the freaking rover without which no one can
generate any research whatsoever. Thus we should be able to read the results
without a paywall in the way.

~~~
unreal37
Same can be said for a lot of things. The American taxpayer paid for the road
on which you use to drive to work. Should you get no salary as a result?

If you think that the rover funding and the _independent non-NASA, non-
American scientists_ who spent months analyzing that data and coming up with
their interpretations should be connected, you are entitled to think that. But
they currently aren't.

------
badave
Aaron Swartz would be proud of you.

------
benwerd
NASA is not a government agency as such, and its work is not required to be
released as public domain. Instead, it falls under the Federal Acquisition
Regulations:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Acquisition_Regulations](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Acquisition_Regulations)

Which isn't to say that I disagree with making its findings available
publicly. But the facts are worth noting.

------
aheilbut
Also, Science is run by, um, the AAAS, which is "an international non-profit
organization dedicated to advancing science around the world by serving as an
educator, leader, spokesperson and professional association"

Couldn't the membership just have a vote to make Science go open access
already?

------
gph
To be fair, it is the norm in the scientific community to publish research in
Journals... and while the Journals make money off it they do provide some
level of editorial standards.

What would have been the alternative here, self-publishing? I suppose that
would be possible for NASA, but it would be highly unprecedented. And besides,
like the top comment says, some of these papers aren't actually done by NASA
scientists, but others using NASA's data.

~~~
Blahah
The correct thing to do would have been to publish the article as open access.
That means nobody has to pay to read it. It costs a small extra fee from the
authors to the journal to make it open access forever.

~~~
morpher
I don't know about other fields, but in physics, the "small extra fee" is
$1700 - $2700.[1] Many researchers prefer to spend this money on actual
research. Fortunately, most physics journals also allow the author to retain
publishing rights (just not on the final typeset version). So, sites like
arxiv.org provide a better alternative. Free-to-reasearcher publishing in a
prestigious journal plus free-to-researcher-and-public publishing elsewhere.

[1] [http://publish.aps.org/edannounce/CC-launch-press-
release](http://publish.aps.org/edannounce/CC-launch-press-release)

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
>Many researchers prefer to spend this money on actual research.

Compared to the cost to license journal access from Elsevier and the other
parasites 3k per published item is cheap. The problem being that it comes from
your grant funds instead of the Uni's general fund, or the Dep't funds.

------
dnautics
> The only ambiguity in the case of these Curiosity papers is that not all of
> the authors are US Government employees, and thus the work is, I am told
> “co-owned” by the authors.

Amazingly, this is an almost exact re-hashing of the debates on IP that
occurred between Lysander Spooner and Benjamin Tucker in the 19th century.
Tucker presented Spooner with a thought experiment: If two people should co-
invent, how should the property be allocated. Spooner, of course, said 50-50.
Then Tucker rejoined - what if one of the co-inventors should choose to give
the patent freely, does that impinge on the property rights of the one who
does not so choose (if you choose to disallow the scenario, does the holding
of the patent impinge on the property right of the one who would choose to
give it away)?

------
rd108
God bless you, Michael Eisen. May the force be with you

------
godber
Links to the PDF documents have been made available by the MSL mission.

[http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/news/whatsnew/index.cfm?FuseAct...](http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/news/whatsnew/index.cfm?FuseAction=ShowNews&NewsID=1523)

These are published in a manner that is consistent with Science's publication
rules.

------
contingencies
As an emerging space power, I believe this campaign needs to get some media
coverage in China.

------
MrBra
way to go

------
wheelerwj
Fuck man, let NASA have the $20. I understand the consternation but of all the
agencies who need money... just let people pay for it.

We aren't talking about pirating lil'wayne's next album or someone who has too
much money.

~~~
rflrob
NASA doesn't see a penny of that $20, which is the problem; it goes to the
publishers of Science (the AAAS, which is, to be fair, a non-profit
organization). While musicians don't get much from the average record sale,
scientists get exactly nothing.

~~~
wheelerwj
yeah... that's lame. NASA should take a cut. in fact, new decree.. all sales
from academic papers should go to NASA. agreed?

~~~
wheelerwj
since when does HN support downvotes?

~~~
rbanffy
Anyone with karma high enough can - and should - downvote comments that
detract from the overall quality of the discussion.

Your karma is close to that point. When you get there, use it wisely.

~~~
mdaniel
FWIW, I think it must be based on the average karma, because my profile is
older and I have more karma than wheelerwj but I have no downvote capacity.

Also, I can't even imagine the amount of contributions that are required to
reach the amount of karma you have.

~~~
icebraining
It's total karma, but the line keeps rising as HN grows. I've only gained them
when my karma reached 500.

