Session 3: Competing Online Architectural Formats: Advantages and Disadvantages
Matthew Bodie: If we are going to change the system, how is that going to be done. This session is going to be more practical than high-level. What will actually happen as a result of the changes envisioned by this workshop? If we build it, they won’t necessarily come (e.g. Apple v. Microsoft). How can we make this attractive to students, teachers, publishers? Everyone at conference has in common that we are producers of intellectual property. While information should be free, but on the other hand, there are competing financial interests.
Susan Case: In teaching professors how to write MC questions, she looked into publishing her materials. She decided to put her book on the web for free. It has spread far and wide, and been translated into multiple languages. While she hasn’t seen financial benefit, it is flattering to have your work used by others, even plagiarized by others.
Daniel Albohn: Works at Sony, downloaded all preliminary memoranda onto his Sony reader. There are devices like Sony’s and the Amazon kindle which enable people to access these documents. Suggests that readers such as the ones described could allow law students to meet environmental concerns and the technology could bridge copyright concerns of publishers. Self-published content can be a candidate for readers like he suggests.
John Mitchell: Why is the screen so small?
Daniel Albohn: 6 inch diagonal screen. 3rd generation digital paper. Grey scale technology. Looking to spur conversation as to how content can be bridged on to his device. As market gets larger, and viable business can be created, screens could be created.
David Skover: before addressing readers, what kind of platform would we want to have to contain digital information? Open or closed source? Since there are so many questions involved in the platform, discussing the reader in depth is putting the cart before the horse.
Joel Thierstein: Before platform and reader, there is the issue of intellectual property. Posed question to medical conference: did Hippocratic oath require them to open up content. Posed same question to this group: does this group have the obligation to open up content (books, journal article, analysis of cases).
Leslie Levin: Lexis currently requires writers to assign copyrights to themselves.
David Vladeck: How many people publish books with an eye towards making money?
Leslie Levin: Money is not motivating force for publishing. Being recognized by peers, wanting to get one’s information out there are motivations she sees more often that financial.
Richard Mixter: tells authors to expect “a really good vacation per year,” nothing more. If they are looking for more, he thinks it is a bad sign.
John Palfrey: One bucket format – IP is relevant (content). As to platform, another bit. Last bit – receptacle/reader. A system should be designed that is dual-license compatible. Copyright transfer should be easily achieved.
Ron Collins: Concurs that dual-license compatible is essential. Thinks copyright protection is important, profits realized from writing are important to him. Flexibility is paramount in selecting an architectural format. If publishers decide on their platform, does that matter if it is an alternative to any other platform selected. This shouldn’t be a war in the selection of the platform.
Gene Koo: In addition to question of payment, issue of credit and reputation is essential.
Kraig Baker: What are the incentives for those investing in the content? Publishers are in the business of making money off of a closed platform. Copyright law created to provide incentives for creation, we should be mindful of this.
John Mayer: . Website CALI is working on for 700k+ cases and more. That is production system. Will be in a variety of formats. Hopes to work with copyrighted authors also. Another site also: legalinformationcommons. Gives option for those wanting to provide for free to others, or any condition upon its distribution. CALI owns lessons on its sites. Previously, a fixed pool of money for royalties. Now, instead of royalties, CALI pays up-front, fixed-fee for intellectual property they acquire (lessons on its sites).
Joel Thierstein: Project he works on at Rice deals with platform/content management system. License for his platform is creative commons type. Isn’t non-commercial. Wanted to engage commercial world – that is why isn’t non-commercial. Idea was to open up information as much as possible. 1M hits/yr, >10M hits/yr. Is it possible law review articles aren’t referenced anymore because they are “locked down”, not available without major inconvenience outside US?
John Mayer: Too bad someone from SSRN not here. Joel found one of top 10 selling stat books, bought rights to it, and released it to all for free, allows professors to add, edit content, etc, add interventions in text. Idea for wealthy lawyers to endow a book rather than chair – allow for free release to all.
Craig Gold: Favors open source. Frustrated that we have to have a conversation on this at all. Technology to do this already exists, he is frustrated with publishers. Depressing that the wheel has to be reinvented because publishers and appliance manufacturers (Kindle) are tying hands of academia.
Marilyn Berger: Does open source give everything away for free?
Daniel Albohn: There is file format and digital encryption. Both format and rights/rules need to be taken into consideration.
Bill McCoy: Analogy to DVD. DVD has both standard technology of format, regardless of brand of DVD player. By putting in DRM (simple enough not to raise Orwellian fears that fair use rights will evaporate), Adobe trying to create platform multi-channel availability.
Heidi Hellekson: Looking at DRM right now. Law reviews not giving permissions for open release without third party copyright protections. Working towards getting this done, but technology and implementation not at point that Gold represented.
Matthew Bodie: Are packets not formatted for easy reproduction?
Heidi Hellekson: We have done custom publishing, but it wasn’t that desirable. Has experimented with that, didn’t take off from a business perspective. Look at their booth at AALS every year for technological updates.
Leslie Levin: Are you (Gold) saying publishers impediment to academics wanting to open source publish?
Craig Gold: You are not stopping publisher from publishing, but the availability of copyrighted published materials in electronic form is limited.
John Chatelaine: This is dictated by authors, not by publishers. Go to academy to have academics release rights.
Craig Gold: What about a “from this point forward” approach?
Leslie Levin: Clause in contract makes mention of using material for electronic purposes, but still issue of 3rd party copyright issues. Has been trying to get 3rd party permission for years, but is always crossed off.
Heidi Hellekson: Same problem as Levin getting permissions.
Craig Gold: Why can’t you say in contract that 3rd party usage prohibited?
Heidi Hellekson: This has happened in one of the series of books she publishes. May have to rework this on past books, but doesn’t anticipate past authors being too enthusiastic on this.
Matthew Bodie: Since professors make nothing off of law review, why is this a problem?
Heidi Hellekson: Law reviews are charging more and more for more than fair use.
Margaret Chon: Multiple party permissions needed for this copyright issue. In music industry, ASCAP and BMI exist to distribute royalties for music – thinks something like this for print copyrights could work. Need collective copyright solution – otherwise we are simply waiting for stuff to drop into public domain.
Ron Collins – If when sometime everyone write a law review article, can the author control whether it should be used more freely than presently possible?
John Palfrey: Open source v. open access. Open access generally refers to content. Harvard last year adopted scheme, making all published work open access with opt out available to author. Has set up open access repository of these works, with idea that would work with other similar repositories. Work should be as openly available as possible. Hopes other law schools will follow.
David Skover: Surprising that others have given away copyright – he has never written anything where he has given it away. He hasn’t ever written without retaining copyright. Can’t imagine that wouldn’t be possible for others to do likewise. Casebooks made up of “packages.” Platform could have case analysis and notes as separate files. Platform could exclude those law reviews that refuse to comply with this new scheme.
Matthew Bodie: What is that “packet?” A chapter on the statute of frauds?
David Skover? Don’t have to conceptualize song as chapter. Break up by content, not by “chapter” – case analysis, notes, case cutdown.
Matthew Bodie: Level of granularity is important.
Bill McCoy: Doesn’t want to diminish importance of rights, but academic journals are over all of this. Wheel doesn’t have to be reinvented – Kindle seems to have ability to serve as platform for receptacle. Seek solutions which have been used in other fields, and put them to work.
Sean Caldwell: Spending a lot of time talking about digitizing print media and wrestling with issue that may be some material that copyright can’t be obtained for. But if we were building something from the ground up, what would it look like?
Faye Jones: need to redefine success points from things such as law review articles published by professors.
Kraig Baker: Licensor/licensee issues important. At some level, everyone is a copyright lawyer now, sensitive as to what happens with his published material. If want to work with publisher to make a creative commons, go to academy to create this. We can at the same time complain to get clearance for use of one’s material and then complain about not having publicly available material.
Greg Silverman: Resources are being put together for pedagogical function. This is the governing principle. As to receptacles, one very important one is course management system (angel, web blackboard, and others). This is as important in academic circles as commercial receptacles. We need industry standards – unclear which one will be dominant at this point. SCORM. Sharable Content Object Reference Model. Dept of Defense standard. A standard that vendors must adhere to if they want to sell to the government. Possibly industry standard for this discussion will develop or mimic SCORM. Thinks IP issue is red herring – either compulsory licensing system or keep old material out. Need framework to support both proprietary and open frameworks.
Ed Rubin: Producers of most content more concerned about credit than money. As to licensing, most producers and consumers and law reviews are part of same institution – law school. Can we work through law schools to get this done? Fees could be collected from students or schools, just like the money paid for books, to finance this.
Marilyn Berger: Law reviews aren’t particularly important citations for law students. Notes and information in case book and edited case itself is more important for student. Judges don’t pay much attention to law reviews. For whom do we want these law reviews to be free? Law schools have SSRN licenses? She doesn’t write law review articles because she thinks people don’t read them anymore. Isn’t this an AALS problem? Can’t they say you have to make the law review articles available?
Sean Caldwell: Berger’s mention of edited case is first mention he recalled today. Do people think that everyone would have similar approach to edit case?
John Mitchell: Maybe don’t edit at all. Force student to find relevant part in cases themselves.
Sean Caldwell: Length of cases, and large parts of cases being irrelevant are reasons for editing.
Heidi Hellekson: publishers being asked for ever more concise materials.
Matthew Bodie: Encapsulation of facts can also be part of editing.
Leslie Levin: Addressing perception that no custom legal publishing exists. Has advisory board which provides feedback on this. It is a complicated process; not easy to do. It is being addressed.
Michael Schwartz: Law review article is a poor means of engaging students. They aren’t designed for that use. Excellent questions (in class?) better to do this than law review articles. A more active engagement of students would be better.
John Chatelaine: 13 years ago, there were 25 West titles put into electronic format, and decision to omit all references to law review articles because of copyright issues. Market didn’t accept any of those things at that time. Left legal publishing in ’98. Ideas of education design and what is of value pedagogically has been considered by publishers for15-20 years.
John Mayer: Even though has been as issue for 15-20 years, no platform has been adopted because law professors don’t know what they want. Need to experiment on this to adopt the best platform. We don’t know best system for teaching with these new models.
Paula Lustbader: Has anyone done student assessment to see how they learn best? They should have a seat at the table. Bets not reading law review articles, notes after cases, or cases themselves.
Matthew Bodie: What about study aids? Has there been a market change for study aids?
Richard Mixter: Has been trying to foment revolution in study aids. Aspen has software which allows their content to be melded with student created content. Getting feedback on this software over the past 18 months – this is aiding them in improving and altering this software. There is interest in this sort of software. It is cautious, and some people are looking at it for the wrong reasons. Now also distributing content not DRM protected. Having problem coming up with business model and 3rd party protections.
Steven Friedland: Maybe we should start asking students on evaluations about these issues. There are a lot of people in legal ed who would benefit from this. Suggests symposium to address this.
Bill Harmon: Good question on what students want. The ability to find and consume information: present information grew up with these skills. He thinks students just want to know how to apply the information. Gives hypotheticals to students.
Paula Lustbader: asks students every semester about course materials. Some of it is useful. She hasn’t asked if students want electronic course materials.
Bill Harmon: Giving materials to students on TWEN allows students to think during class rather than just typing what teacher is saying.
Heidi Hellekson: Why do people write case books even, if there is the question on law review articles? Offered reasons for writing law review articles. Wouldn’t dictate that those submitting work to her couldn’t cite or contain law review articles. Her authors very invested in royalty system. Why one writes has something to do why people teach.
Conrad Johnson: As to survey question, asks his students about electronic materials. Usually students want the casebook electronically to be able to alter/own material. Wants to keep students in the loop.