The Net works because of a series of informal agreements...[Examples]...And websites allow search engines to copy their content into indexes, even though at some level that action raises copyright concerns. The Google Print lawsuit puts the last of these practices in question. On some level, copying a Web page to facilitate searching isn't all that different from copying a book to facilitate searching. And copying an RSS feed to put content onto another site isn't so different either. Unravel the notion that some content sharing benefits everyone, and therefore should be acceptable despite the nominal boundaries of intellectual property, and the Internet economy, especially the Web 2.0 economy, comes crashing down. What's worrisome to me is that, just as the informal practices for sharing online content are being challenged, the informal practices for sharing Internet traffic and addressing are under stress as well....Years from now, will we look back at this as the period when the Internet came apart at its seams?
Posted by
Peter Suber at 10/23/2005 01:12:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
