Peter Suber interview on copyright and scholarship. And part 2 of the same interview. Everyone must read this.
The [free online scholarship] movement doesn’t need to abolish or even reform copyright law. If authors of scholarly journal articles retain the copyright to their articles (transferring only, say, the right of first print publication, and perhaps some other rights), then authors can consent to widespread copying and finally let copyright advance their interests rather than those of publishers. In particular, authors could consent to put their writings on the internet without any financial, legal, or technical barriers to access. This is what the FOS movement is trying to achieve, and it can all happen within the boundaries of existing copyright law.
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