The construction of public knowledge database should jump out of the "knowledge network strange circle"

Clarify the responsibilities and rights of authors, journals and platforms——

The construction of public knowledge database should jump out of the "knowledge network strange circle"

Guangming Daily reporter Chen Peng

CNKI, which was pried open by public opinion, made concessions: apologies, compensation, and partial price cuts. Recently, the incident has made waves again: after CNKI lost the lawsuit against a scholar, it submitted an application for retrial, which was rejected by the court.

According to the Yangtze River Daily, Su Shaozhi, a retired professor at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, learned that his teacher, Professor Zhao Dexin, had won the case for defending his rights, and sued CNKI for his paper being included without authorization. In December 2020, the Beijing Internet Court rendered a first-instance judgment in the relevant case, and was told that the network compensated the plaintiff for economic losses of 2800 yuan and reasonable expenses of 334 yuan, a total of 3134 yuan. CNKI argued that the basic facts determined in the original judgment lacked evidence to prove that the application of the law was wrong, and that it had fulfilled its "duty of reasonable care, was subjectively not at fault, and should not bear the liability for damages", and later applied to the Beijing Intellectual Property Court for a retrial. Recently, the court finally rejected his application for retrial.

CNKI started by disseminating the academic achievements of scholars and academic journals, and its business model has been criticized. However, with the continuous expansion of the number of users, scholars and journals are inseparable from CNKI, and a "strange circle" has formed.

In the knowledge dissemination chain, the sub-delegation and use of copyright, network dissemination and publication are intertwined, what is the relationship between authors, journals and database platforms? How should rights and responsibilities be divided? How to jump out of the "CNKI circle"? The reporter recently launched an investigation into this.

"Litigation costs are high, time-consuming, and difficult to obtain evidence"

"After CNKI was sued by the author and lost the lawsuit in the court, the reasons for applying for a retrial were basically similar to the defenses of the first and second instances, but the court ruled that the defense grounds were not established and the application was rejected. CNKI ignores the Copyright Law and other laws and regulations, infringing the copyrights of many authors. Zhang Hongbo, director general of the China Literary Works Association (hereinafter referred to as the "Chinese Writers Association"), told reporters about his several confrontations with CNKI.

In 2017, the Association of Literary and Literary Authors filed the first online rights protection lawsuit for written works, arguing that CNKI had infringed the copyright owner's right of information network dissemination by electronically copying wang Zengqi's work "Ordination" to the public for paid download, obtaining illegal revenues, and infringing the copyright owner's right to disseminate information on the Internet. After Wang Zengqi's death, the copyright of the article "Ordination" was inherited by his three children, and the Literary Association was authorized to centrally manage and safeguard rights.

Jointly initiated by the China Writers Association, the China Federation of Literary and Literary Associations, the China Journalist Association and other units and copyright holders, the Literary and Writing Association is the only collective management organization for the copyright of written works in mainland China.

The reporter searched the judgment document network, and as of now, there are very few cases in which individuals sue CNKI and win the case.

The Association of Literature and Literature has compiled a list of more than 20,000 works by the first batch of 110 well-known writers and members of CNKI to prove the huge number and scope of infringement. However, it did not take long for CNKI to remove more than 20,000 works.

Professor Zhao Dexin sued CNKI, and after 8 years of rights protection, he waited for CNKI's formal apology. CNKI said that it will humbly listen to the opinions and suggestions of legal experts, scholars and publishing institutions, and strictly implement relevant laws, regulations and policy requirements.

"For copyright owners, litigation costs are high, time-consuming, and difficult to collect evidence, and ordinary copyright owners may not go directly to the court to sue and protect their rights, but the individual choice to protect their rights has not made the problems exposed by CNKI disappear." Zhang Hongbo believes, "But it must always be solved." ”

The boundaries of network reprinting have become clearer, and "first authorize, then use" has been reconfirmed

Under the protection of intellectual property rights, knowledge can be flowed in an orderly manner in society. Different from the path of authors advocating copyright in the era of paper reading, entering the Internet era and safeguarding the rights and interests of authors should also include "the dissemination of works".

Cong Lixian, dean of the School of Intellectual Property of East China University of Political Science and Law, said: "People's understanding of the identification of the key situation of the case 'network reprint' is also gradually becoming clear. In 2006, Cong Lixian's doctoral dissertation was entitled "Research on Online Copyright Issues", which explored what is a network work, who owns the content transmitted in the digital space and the rights arising.

In 2000, the Supreme People's Court issued a judicial interpretation stipulating that works that have been published in newspapers and periodicals or disseminated on the Internet, except for special statements made by relevant parties, reproduced or excerpted on the Internet, paid remuneration and indicated sources in accordance with relevant regulations, do not constitute infringement, that is, the legal permission for online reprinting does not require the consent of the copyright owner.

"This is based on the actual situation in the early days of the rise of the Internet at that time to promote the prosperity of online content dissemination." However, in 2006, the state promulgated the Regulations on the Protection of the Right of Dissemination on Information Networks, and online reprinting did not receive additional exemptions. In other words, online reprinting constitutes infringement as long as it does not have the permission of the copyright owner. Cong Li introduced first.

"Authorize first, use later" is confirmed by the newly revised Copyright Law. Article 53 of the third revised Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China, which came into effect on June 1, 2021, clearly states that what constitutes infringement includes: "Where a work is reproduced, distributed, performed, screened, broadcast, compiled, or disseminated to the public through information networks without the permission of the copyright owner, unless otherwise provided in this Law." ”

In similar incidents, the rights and interests are legally confirmed, but few people take the initiative to claim it. A young scholar who has just published a paper in a core journal of education said, "As a university teacher, I don't care much about these things, I just want the paper to be disseminated online."

"Nowadays, many journals have fewer and fewer paper subscribers, some journals rely on layout fees to survive, and academic dissemination basically or completely rely on digital platforms. It is undeniable that CNKI has brought great convenience to academic research and dissemination, but platforms such as CNKI have curbed the 'throat' of academic journals and controlled the dissemination and influence of journals. Zhang Hongbo concluded, "Scholars and journals love and hate CNKI. ”

The "unilateral manuscript contract" of the journal is invalid, and the compilation of works can enjoy the benefits of copyright

Publishing papers is not a new thing, but why did this CNKI incident cause such a big public reaction? This also starts with the "one-paper agreement" between the journal and the author.

In the office, Zhang Hongbo randomly picked up three periodicals and handed them to reporters. On the copyright page, all three journals published a similar "note", that is, if an author submits an article to this journal, it is deemed to have ceded the rights related to the work to the journal, and the journal has the right to dispose of the author's work, including the right of online dissemination.

"The copyright of a journal is mainly reflected in the fact that the journal, as a compilation work, enjoys complete copyright in accordance with the law, can exercise relevant rights such as the right of information network dissemination, and obtains benefits, but the premise of exercising its rights is that it must obtain the permission of each original author. The copyright notices and manuscripts unilaterally published by the journal are only wishful thinking or invitations, and cannot constitute a valid contract. Zhang Hongbo said.

Ma Dejian, editor-in-chief of a senior journal of a "double-first-class" university, revealed: "CNKI's approach is not to meet with authors, trying to use 'one paper agreement' to solve the problem of author copyright and dissemination attribution, avoid direct relations with authors, and transfer the responsibility to the journal." He studied the relevant cases and found that "CNKI claims to have agreed with the journal to sign an online communication agreement with the author." However, the journal involved in the case could not come up with a valid agreement with the author."

"In the process of cooperation with journals, in order to publish their works, authors often do not make any statements on the copyright statement of the journal, or regard this as a common practice of agreement, which is really forced to be helpless." Zhang Hongbo said.

It can be seen that the author's "silence" of the journal is basically the same as the logic of the journal being "coerced" by the platform, all in order to obtain the right of network dissemination.

The reporter found that many journals belong to universities or scientific research institutions, and some editorial staff are only two or three. Some professionals pointed out that mainland journals as a whole are characterized by "small and weak".

Hao Mingming, deputy editor-in-chief of a university journal in the north, told reporters that CNKI "packaged" the journal at a price of about 200 yuan per year as an author's manuscript fee, but because of the two lines of revenue and expenditure, the income of the journal's editorial department was handed over to the higher-level competent department, that is, the university to deal with, "We have not seen this money." Of course, no author asked us to".

However, there are exceptions, a person in charge of a central university journal told reporters that CNKI had asked to sign an exclusive agreement with the school's journal packaging, requiring that the school-affiliated journals can only be disseminated on the CNKI in addition to public welfare communication, but was rejected by the school. "These journals are good journals and have a great impact on academia. We don't want to be limited by CNKI."

Because of their high quality, these journals were eventually included in CNKI. However, the person in charge said: "The quality of the publication itself often determines its status when getting along with CNKI." CNKI 'turns a blind eye' to good journals, however, the situation of ordinary journals is very different. ”

The maximum cost of the platform should be the online copyright royalty, but the emphasis is on "selective payment"

In December 2021, CNKI significantly lowered the download price of master's and doctoral dissertations. The master's thesis was reduced from 15 yuan / book to 7.5 yuan / book, and the doctoral thesis was reduced from 25 yuan / book to 9.5 yuan / book, a decrease of more than 50%.

"It doesn't solve the underlying problem." In Zhang Hongbo's view, "For a large number of academic papers, including master's and doctoral dissertations, CNKI adopts 'selective payment', only emphasizing that users pay to CNKI, but ignoring or intentionally ignoring the need to obtain authorization from copyright owners and pay copyright fees." ”

"The biggest cost of CNKI is the use fee of online copyright, but at present, the source of copyright is mainly no authorization, vague authorization, invalid authorization, and a very small number of valid authorizations have been obtained." Cong Lixian suggested that, taking into account the actual situation, CNKI and other platforms should return reasonable consideration and copyright benefits to the copyright owner, and cannot return it to the hands of "intermediaries" such as periodicals, and can use third-party audit methods to calculate the remedial benefits and copyright fees of CNKI and other platforms, and establish a sharing and payment mechanism.

"For a huge number of papers and copyright holders, it is not of practical significance to get a small amount of copyright fees, such as one yuan or even a few cents." Ma Dejian frankly said that the influence of mainland journals is insufficient, it is difficult to compete with CNKI, "in foreign countries, many journals are strong enough, they are knowledge data platforms."

In the chain of knowledge dissemination, what is the relationship between authors, journals, and platforms?

"You can't generalize." Hao Mingming believes that from the perspective of knowledge dissemination, everyone is the main body of knowledge production and dissemination. The author is the first producer, the editor is the processor, and also undertakes part of the production work. Platforms such as CNKI do not move works to the Internet as they are, but also need to be digitally processed, and there is technical investment and personnel investment.

Relative to authors and journals, the platform has the right to speak. In fact, the law also has strict restrictions on the platform.

"The Copyright Law treats the database formed by the editing work of the platform as a compilation of works. The platform only enjoys the copyright of the compiled work in the database formed by itself. Deng Shemin, a professor at the Law School of Wuhan University, reminded, "The copyright is basically the same as the copyright of the journal, and it only enjoys copyright for the selection of the layout and compilation format style, and does not enjoy the copyright for individual works in the database." In other words, the issue of author authorization had to be solved. ”

"Avoid using databases as a monetized tool to limit the dissemination and sharing of knowledge." Deng Shemin suggested that the role of copyright collective management organizations should be brought into play, and the functions of collective management organizations in safeguarding the interests of authors and disseminating works should be strengthened; database regulations should be formulated to standardize the operation of database platforms; and at the same time, the law enforcement role of copyright administrative organs should be brought into play to rectify the chaos of database platforms.

"Authors, journals, and platforms are all part of the knowledge production community." Hao Mingming agrees that the "free access, comprehensive and open" model of knowledge acquisition "means that the state has to invest greater costs." All parties can transfer part of their rights and interests on the basis of consultation to ensure a smoother dissemination of knowledge. For example, authors and journals are effectively authorized, the same type of journals cooperate to assert rights and interests, and the platform charges reasonable fees, "commercial companies can participate, but always by the government to reflect the public welfare."

In 2013, the National Database of Academic Journals in Philosophy and Social Sciences, built by the Survey and Data Information Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, was officially launched, and all of this database is free to use.

Cong Lixian said: "Who will build, how to build, how to operate require top-level design, and the more critical issue is whether the national academic resource database platform built can be attractive and influential, it remains to be seen." ”

In an era of increasing technology, knowledge should not become more and more expensive. Many respondents have conveyed a voice: AS THE MAIN BODY OF CONTENT DISSEMINATION, CNKI's contribution to academic exchanges is indelible, but excessive commercialization hinders people's knowledge sharing.

(Some of the respondents in this article use pseudonyms)

Guangming Daily ( 2022-01-20 08 edition)

Source: Guangming Network - Guangming Daily