 |
 |
Hi Oli I’m freelance and I get worked up about copyright. It is not a matter about practical differences, I have assigned licences to others to use my work which gives me virtually nothing other than retaining the copyright, but retaining that copyright is essential. I have signed it away in the past when I was younger and both less confident and less informed, but I never do now. I offer generous licensing terms but always refuse to sign my copyright to an organisation. And am constantly amazed at the number of publishers and broadcasters that routinely ask you to do this, but that’s another conversation. Without wanting to be over dramatic, I don’t use my human rights on a day to day basis and probably for my life there is very little practical difference for me if the Human Rights Act were not in existence. But there is a huge difference when I need to call on it. Yes, there are big differences between human rights and copyright and I am not equating them, but if we don’t hang on to our rights in either context we risk losing them. It’s not necessarily the practical events that bother me, though they can be the difference between another small pay cheque and nothing, it’s the principle that is extremely important and no practical considerations should, in my view, bow to the principle. Toby Toby Murcott From: psci-com: on public engagement with science [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Usher, Oli Sent: 12 November 2013 13:22 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [PSCI-COM] freelance science communicators wanted Not so - moral rights cannot be assigned, only waived. It’s quite possible to assign copyright (including to an organisation which will then publish under CC-by) without surrendering your moral rights. But this is possibly a moot point as this is arguably news reporting, for which the UK doesn’t recognise moral rights in any case: http://www.ipo.gov.uk/types/copy/c-otherprotect/c-moralrights.htm. (Question: don’t moral rights need to be explicitly asserted in writing in the first place? I certainly never did that when I did freelancing. Does anybody?) Quibbling aside, can anybody explain to me what *practical* difference there is between a freelance contributor CC-by licensing their work, and them assigning it to an organisation which CC-by licenses it? I can see there is a difference in procedure, and I know some people get very het up about it, but I genuinely don’t get why it’s such a big deal. Oli From: psci-com: on public engagement with science [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Francis Sedgemore Sent: 12 November 2013 12:54 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [PSCI-COM] freelance science communicators wanted The open-source model, and that includes Creative Commons, is predicated on the retention by content creators of copyright and moral rights. Sign away copyright to another individual or corporate entity, and you forego all rights in your work. One should never underestimate the importance of moral rights to freelance writers. Last night I received an off-list message from a former freelance contributor to Research Media Ltd. This chap tells me that he was paid £50 to edit an interview transcript down to 750 words, and produce a 1,250-word feature article. Substantial background research work was required. Even a highly experienced and efficient writer would take hours to complete such a task, such that the equivalent hourly rate for the job could conceivably fall below the national minimum wage. Contrast this with the £60 for one hour mentioned yesterday by MK, which is quite reasonable when one factors in the amount of time spent by self-employed wordsmiths writers in procuring work and dealing with business administration, and the reduced overhead costs incurred by companies that commission freelance workers. In her on-list reply today, Sarah Anderson refers to 500-650-word short pieces. Many experienced writers would struggle to knock out a coherent 500-word blog post in an hour, and, if you will excuse my cynicism, blogging is stream-of-consciousness stuff that requires little or nothing in the way of considered thought. One assumes that RML is looking for something more substantial and rigorous than this. Light editing and news briefing jobs for RML that take no more than an hour to complete might be cost-effective for a freelance, but not interview condensing and feature article writing. Unless, that is, RML’s current rates for the latter are several times those quoted by my correspondent. RML is in the business of promoting the work of scientists and technologists. As such it is PR rather than journalism, and the business model involves actively soliciting within academia and engineering industry. RML is one of a number of companies operating in this field, and the going rate for feature articles showcasing the work of researchers is €2,500 or more. Those of you who understand Swedish can learn more of RML here… http://goo.gl/SejWSt In the respected science magazine Curie, journalist Anne Brynolf quotes senior academics and publishing executives, and discusses the blurring of the line between journalism and PR in the context of open-access publishing. Freelance rates aside, that is an interesting subject in itself. The title of Brynolf’s article translates as “Pay dearly to showcase your research”. Francis On 12 Nov 13, at 11:10, Usher, Oli <[log in to unmask]> wrote: This is technically true, but the distinction is tiny in practice – CC-by licences are very permissive and the economic value of the rights which are retained by the copyright holder is minimal. (NB this is not true of any of the other CC licences, all of which have substantial strings attached). The only thing the rights holder could still potentially do for a CC-by-licensed work is to charge for the right to reproduce the work without attribution. Oli From: psci-com: on public engagement with science [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Sarah Snell-Pym Sent: 12 November 2013 10:53 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [PSCI-COM] freelance science communicators wanted But you don't need to sign them away for the work to be used under that licence. Signing away implies that you are giving the company the rights and then they release it under the CC - so it really depends on what they meant in the first place. Sarah On 12 Nov 2013, at 10:11, Usher, Oli wrote: Signing away intellectual property rights so things can be released under Creative Commons licences is rather different to signing away intellectual property rights so they can be exploited commercially without giving compensation, isn’t it? It’s also the basis of the Open Access model for scholarly publications, not to mention free/open source software, citizen science and Wiki projects, which I imagine a lot of people on this list are supportive of. Oli From: psci-com: on public engagement with science [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Francis Sedgemore Sent: 11 November 2013 17:24 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: [PSCI-COM] freelance science communicators wanted If a “standard assignment” is a short news piece of no more than a couple of hundred words, with little or no research input, then £60 might be acceptable. I am talking about NUJ recommended rates for the job. Think of it in terms of an hourly equivalent rate. What is your time worth as a specialist writer? As for copyright, this is a concern, and the NUJ position is that freelance writers should not sign away their intellectual property rights. On the other hand, does an old news briefing have any resale value? Let’s not jump to conclusions, but instead wait for clarification from the publisher. Francis On 11 Nov 13, at 17:11, Paul G Raven <[log in to unmask]> wrote: Good points, Tony. (Although, speaking from personal experience, anyone willing to contemplate £60 flat-fee writing gigs is probably so accustomed to signing over all their rights to the work that they'd not even blink at being asked to do so. The rent doesn't pay itself, after all.) -- Dr Francis Sedgemore journalist, writer and physicist telephone: +44 7840 191336 website: sedgemore.com -- Dr Francis Sedgemore journalist, writer and physicist telephone: +44 7840 191336 website: sedgemore.com ********************************************************************** Commands - send an email (any subject) to [log in to unmask] with one of the following messages (ignoring text in brackets) • set psci-com nomail (to stop receiving messages while on holiday) • set psci-com mail (to resume getting messages) • signoff psci-com (to leave the list) • Subscribe here https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=psci-com Contact list owner at [log in to unmask] Small print and JISCMail acceptable use policy https://sites.google.com/site/pscicomjiscmail/the-small-print ********************************************************************** No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 2014.0.4158 / Virus Database: 3629/6828 - Release Date: 11/11/13 ********************************************************************** Commands - send an email (any subject) to [log in to unmask] with one of the following messages (ignoring text in brackets) • set psci-com nomail (to stop receiving messages while on holiday) • set psci-com mail (to resume getting messages) • signoff psci-com (to leave the list) • Subscribe here https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=psci-com Contact list owner at [log in to unmask] Small print and JISCMail acceptable use policy https://sites.google.com/site/pscicomjiscmail/the-small-print ********************************************************************** ********************************************************************** Commands - send an email (any subject) to [log in to unmask] with one of the following messages (ignoring text in brackets) • set psci-com nomail (to stop receiving messages while on holiday) • set psci-com mail (to resume getting messages) • signoff psci-com (to leave the list) • Subscribe here https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=psci-com Contact list owner at [log in to unmask] Small print and JISCMail acceptable use policy https://sites.google.com/site/pscicomjiscmail/the-small-print **********************************************************************