
Elsevier is taking down papers from Academia.edu - georgebashi
http://svpow.com/2013/12/06/elsevier-is-taking-down-papers-from-academia-edu/
======
ggchappell
FTA:

> Lots of researchers post PDFs of their own papers on their own web-sites.
> It’s always been so, because even though technically it’s in breach of the
> copyright transfer agreements that we blithely sign, ....

Not true. Copyright transfer agreements vary a great deal. I've published a
few papers, and these days I don't sign any transfer agreement without reading
it. A fair number of them specifically allow for posting copies of papers on
personal websites.[1]

Probably the Elsevier agreement does not allow it. But since they've gotten so
much poor publicity, no one who publishes with them has any excuse for being
unaware of the consequences.

[1] OTOH, I'm in math/comp. sci., and Mike Tayor is in paleontology; maybe
things are different in that field.

\---------------------------------

EDIT. More FTA:

> Rich FitzJohn speculated: I wonder what their long game is here; petty
> harassment like that makes me way less inclined to publish in an Elsevier
> journal.

Seriously? After ridiculous subscription prices, aggressively making publicly
funded research difficult to get at, revelations of fake "peer-reviewed"
journals, paying for shill reviews, the resignations of several editorial
boards, more than a year of a widely publicized boycott, and now this, he's
just "way less inclined to publish". What does it take to get people to stop?

Alas, I know the answer. It is that tenure & promotion committees stop
considering publications in journals like Elsevier's to be worth a lot more
than publications in journals that are run ethically.

------
davidgerard
Alicia Wise, from Elsevier, claims this is only final versions. That they
_never_ go after preprints on authors' own hosting.

This claim is, of course, false.
[http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4527505&cid=4562...](http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4527505&cid=45622313)

I have asked her for an explanation; I'm sure it will be of interest.

------
davidgerard
This has also made the news:

[http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/posting-your-
latest-a...](http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/posting-your-latest-
article-you-might-have-to-take-it-down/48865)
[http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/12/06/1945224/elsevier-...](http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/12/06/1945224/elsevier-
going-after-authors-sharing-their-own-papers)

Those defending Elsevier need to keep in mind Elsevier’s fraudulent
pseudojournals, blatant scientific fraud for marketing cash. Elsevier passed
the “reasonable doubt” event horizon long ago.
[http://kmccready.wordpress.com/2013/12/06/elsevier-shoots-
it...](http://kmccready.wordpress.com/2013/12/06/elsevier-shoots-itself-in-
the-face-again/)

------
ivan_ah
Actually, this totally makes sense to me.

If you post on papers on your ~home/ page it is fine, but if you give your
papers to a third party which operates a for profit website then it is not the
same.

I am generally not a big fan of Elsevier, but in this case I am totally with
them on the matter.

~~~
sitkack
I am actually not a fan of academia.edu, they seem like the scribd/slideshare
of academic research. They are another paywall speedbump in the free exchange
if ideas. Whenever I hit their page I immediately look for another source.

If they had been more like stackoverflow and less like experts exchange ...
but they are not.

