Fighting Digital Piracy in Publishing: Interview with Sari Frances and Lui Simpson

Abstract

In this installment of “Conversations,” Sari Frances, manager of digital license compliance for IEEE, and Lui Simpson, vice president of global policy for the Association of American Publishers, discuss their work in protecting the intellectual property (IP) of publishers from digital piracy.

Keywords:

• Association of American Publishers
• digital piracy
• IEEE
• intellectual property
• Lui Simpson
• publishing
• Sari Frances

Introduction

IEEE (formerly, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) has over 395,000 members in 160 countries. These members include “computer scientists, software developers, information technology professionals, physicists, medical doctors,” and more (2018a). One role IEEE plays as an association is overseeing the publication and distribution of numerous proceedings, research studies, and other technical resources for these professionals. All together this comprises over 4 million documents, a significant amount of intellectual property (IP) (2018b).

The Association of American Publishers (AAP) is a leading legal and policy advocate for hundreds of publishers, including commercial, nonprofits, and academic organizations. AAP’s advocacy efforts include addressing policy makers on legislative reform issues affecting its members and representing their interests in negotiations regarding international trade. In addition, the AAP undertakes enforcement efforts against piracy both for print and online publications (2015).

Recently, academic publishers, both commercial and nonprofits, have been threatened by a growing surge in copyright infringement via pirate sites such as LibGen and Sci-Hub. As of this interview, both the American Chemical Society and Elsevier have won lawsuits against Sci-Hub for copyright infringement (Chawla, 2017). In the following interview, Sari Frances and Lui Simpson discuss their work in the publishing industry, in particular the protection of IP. Frances is manager of digital license compliance for IEEE. She has 15 years of experience in the publishing industry and has managed IEEE’s IP Protection Program since 2008. Frances’s responsibilities include collaborating with the legal, information technology (IT) security, IP rights, and sales departments at IEEE along with representing IEEE in industry trade associations in antipiracy efforts. She is a frequent speaker at industry conferences on digital piracy. Simpson is vice president of global policy for the AAP, where she oversees policy and IP protection initiatives for AAP members in several international markets. Simpson’s IP experience includes previous work as the senior counsel for intellectual property for the Entertainment Software Association. Simpson speaks at both domestic and international forums on IP policy and international trade issues.

Scott Vieira (SV): To begin, Sari, tell me about your publishing experience and background, including what you do with IEEE.

Sari Frances (SF): I began in sales support, moved to managing contracts, and then was offered a newly created position developing a program based on misuse of our content. Today, I manage our IP Protection Program, which consists of initiatives and innovative methods to protect the IP entrusted to IEEE by our authors. I represent IEEE in industry efforts to mitigate and remediate digital piracy by actively participating in the Content Protection and Policy Committee (CPPC) headed by the AAP, and I cochair an executive steering group dedicated to addressing sites that are a significant threat to the industry.

SV: Would you tell me some more about the CPPC?

SF: AAP member companies designate a representative to serve on the committee, which works together to identify enforcement and policy priorities that the members address collectively. The committee, which is led by Lui Simpson, has addressed both IP enforcement and market access issues in China and pursued litigation in several key markets. The AAP also monitors copyright legislative developments around the world.

SV: You mention “addressing sites that are a significant threat to the industry.” What does this “addressing” entail?

SF: Investigating and then taking action if and when necessary.

SV: Likewise, Lui, would you tell me about your publishing experience and background and what you do for the AAP?

Lui Simpson (LS): I’m not a publisher but a lawyer. I’m vice president of global policy for the AAP, in which role I am an advocate for our members on matters of law and policy (whether copyright, trade, or technology). In this capacity, I address both the United States and foreign governments on issues of concern to our members, participate in proceedings before governments and intergovernmental organizations, conduct enforcement efforts to protect AAP member copyrights, and serve as liaison to a variety of international and domestic associations and cross-industry coalitions.

SV: Sari, I’m confident that most of our readers are somewhat familiar with IEEE. Nonetheless, tell me about the organization, particularly what role IEEE plays in publishing.

SF: IEEE is the world’s largest professional technical organization dedicated to the advancement of technology for the benefit of humanity. IEEE provides a wide range of services to its members and the broader technical community. Among these are organizing conferences, developing standards, and publishing high-quality periodicals that facilitate the exchange of knowledge among technology professionals. Many IEEE publications maintain Impact Factors at the top of their fields. IEEE publications are also among the most highly cited in U.S. and European patents.

SV: Lui, would you tell me some about the Association of American Publishers?

LS: The AAP represents the world’s most distinguished publishers of books, research journals, and education solutions. AAP’s mission is to advance a rational legal framework that incentivizes and protects the publication of creative expression and professional content locally and globally. AAP has a strong Board of Directors, an experienced professional staff, and a number of expert committees, including the CPPC, through which we draw on experts in AAP’s membership. Generally speaking, AAP represents publishers in the courts, before government agencies, in legislative proceedings, and in industry discussions.

SV: What do you see as some of the biggest challenges, perhaps even threats, to publishers today?

SF: The biggest threat is the perception that scholarly content should be free. There are true costs in publishing high-quality content, and publishers have to contend with both a naivete and acquiescence to this reality and, in some cases, willful intent to ignore.

LS: In terms of policy, efforts by some to weaken copyright protection by adopting overbroad exceptions and limitations to copyright protection rank high with respect to challenges the industry faces. These efforts threaten investments and, frankly, livelihoods—particularly for smaller serials that are so important to the research community. What is particularly challenging is the sometimes less than candid rhetoric used by certain quarters to undermine copyright while obfuscating the fact that their platform/company (for example) likely stands to gain when exceptions to copyright protection are so broad as to allow unfettered and uncompensated use of copyrighted works created and produced by the rights holder.

On the enforcement front, it is the lack of adequate and effective measures, particularly online, to address infringing activity occurring on a massive scale. There are many examples of problematic online sites that facilitate infringing activity. For the journal publishing sector, the threat presented by the pirate site Sci-Hub is of significant concern to the industry. The site should concern all who have a role in journal publishing—the researcher/author, editors, publishers, and library and university administrators. The site is a willful copyright infringer, and its activities are a disservice to the public interest (as so opined by a U.S. district court).

SV: For a nonprofit organization like IEEE, how does the piracy of research publications threaten it?

SF: Piracy is a significant concern for IEEE. Damage from the theft of IP includes loss of visits to IEEE Xplore (our digital library), which results in librarians not seeing the full use and value of their subscriptions. It also means that we lose our connection with the users and readers of IEEE Xplore. As a not-for-profit, IEEE has no shareholders. Any surplus that we earn is invested in activities directly related to our mission, such as organizing conferences for emerging technologies and launching new journals.

LS: There seems to be a failure of understanding as to the role and contribution of publishers to the scholarly communications’ ecosystem. Or frankly, a refusal to see the value that publishers bring to this endeavor. Publishers invest not just in the physical infrastructure that facilitates discoverability of and access to scientific research but also in the process of making available high-quality, peer-reviewed publications that provide and preserve a coherent and accurate scientific record. These tasks are not without significant monetary investment, which the journal publisher fronts with the understanding that this investment will be recovered through a variety of subscription models. If publishers cannot recover these up-front investments, how can they reinvest in the journal publication process and infrastructure necessary to scholarly communications? Piracy threatens this ecosystem and therefore the continued availability of accurate records of scientific research.

SV: Who do you think is using these pirated research publications, and what do you think motivates users to access them?

LS: Surprisingly, even well-meaning individuals who know that piracy is not acceptable also use pirated research publications. A variety of reasons are articulated—the cost of journal articles is too high, accessing through my institution is too cumbersome, the research has been paid for and should be available for free. Most of these reasons would seem to stem from a misunderstanding of the ecosystem and the role that publishers play in facilitating the communication of scholarly and scientific research and the extent of the investment (of time, money, and personnel) necessary to the journal publishing endeavor.

It perhaps should be emphasized that what publishers bring to “market” is the published article that has undergone the peer review and editing process. The research or funding institution has not paid for these publishing services; the research institution’s funding goes to, for instance, lab equipment and research assistants—not to the cost of maintaining the delivery infrastructure; the salaries of the editors that refine the raw research manuscript into a polished, published article; or the technical staff that embed HTML tags into the document to make it discoverable and searchable.

SV: Do you see any good for scholarly communications coming from the challenge of piracy in research publications?

LS: Not particularly. The question of ease of access is one that all publishers continue to grapple with—whether commercial or noncommercial. I suppose the challenge of piracy has increased publisher efforts at improving their use of technology to protect the works they publish.

SF: While piracy is a challenge, IEEE also views it as an opportunity to improve how we serve researchers and authors. We are striving to make our content more discoverable and accessible and are working on improvements to our interface and user experience. Publishers and customers are becoming more aware of and educated about the threats to the security of their institutional networks and how protecting them from illicit activity and hacks is important, because of threats that can go beyond a loss of IP. IEEE has also been giving greater focus to open access publications. For example, IEEE Access, our award-winning multidisciplinary open access journal, has published over 3,000 articles since its inception in 2013. On a more technical level, one of the things we are working on is getting support and acceptance to implement solutions that can secure electronic resources. It is critical to motivate these communities to take action; otherwise, digital piracy will continue to grow and do significant harm.

SV: Do you see piracy of research publications ever going away? If so, how?

SF: Piracy of intellectual property is not a new phenomenon. The medium of infringement may continue to change, but the conduct likely will not end altogether. It is our hope that by educating individuals, providing superior content, and enhancing the value of the user experience, people will continue choosing to obtain the content they desire through the proper legal channels.

LS: Piracy has always been a constant—across all types of content. What has been different over the last 10–15 years is the advancement of technology such that piracy can now occur with the click of a mouse, and anyone with a scanner (or these days, a smart phone) and an Internet subscription account can engage in infringing activity.

Will piracy of research publications ever go away? Probably not. But the harmful effects of piracy have to be mitigated, and publishers will continue to take the measures necessary to protect their rights and the rights of their authors.

SV: Sari, as specific as you can be: What is IEEE’s strategy to curtail piracy?

SF: IEEE has a robust intellectual property defense strategy. We don’t want to divulge all of our details, but in general terms, we plan on continuing to build upon our current IT security resources to better track and manage activity, engaging with others in the industry to develop best practices, and partnering with our authors and readers to provide tools and solutions that can enhance their experience with IEEE.

SV: Lui, what is CPPC’s strategy to curtail piracy?

LS: I cannot speak to specific strategies. However, I can say that all available remedies are always the subject of discussion within AAP, among AAP staff, and with AAP members. The protection of publishers’ rights, after all, is a primary AAP mission. How the specific strategies are deployed very much depends on the target.

SV: Sari, I understand the need to not go into details, particularly with regards to developing tighter IT security controls. However, in other areas, like engaging with others in the industry to develop best practices, partnering, and developing new tools and solutions, would you share some examples of what IEEE and other publishers are working on?

SF: For example, we are currently developing a new workflow for customer threat intelligence notifications that we intend to share with the academic community in the next month or so. However, since there are many stakeholders involved in the preparation of this workflow, we plan to look for feedback before officially rolling this out.

SV: In enforcing copyright, how do you manage the delicate balance of protecting intellectual property while at the same time not overly burdening or inconveniencing legitimate customers and users?

SF: When we detect infringing activity on IEEE Xplore through a subscriber’s account, we immediately notify the institution and work with them directly if they need further assistance. While we would prefer not to temporarily suspend subscribers from accessing IEEE Xplore, we do need to take appropriate steps to protect the intellectual property. We are also constantly looking for ways to improve our communication and processes to make our efforts as unobtrusive as possible.

LS: Those who choose to engage in infringing activity or use pirated copies actually contribute to the “burden” and “inconvenience” of legitimate customers and subscribers. Technological protection measures (TPMs) are employed because they are a useful mechanism for enabling legitimate access to trusted content. TPMs have allowed publishers the flexibility to provide access to subscribers in a variety of ways and at the time and place of the subscriber’s choosing—a convenience that is enabled by the use of TPMs. Unfortunately, the employment of such measures may become more stringent when certain parties continue to free-ride.

Publishers continue to invest in user-friendly business models, trying to find ways to facilitate ease of access—but those efforts are often hindered or eroded by having to address the outliers who choose to engage in piracy.

SV: What do you see as some of the important developing trends in the near future regarding publishing and intellectual property?

SF: Greater coordination and collective efforts from academic institutions and publishers is an important and exciting development. Our collective efforts in legal action, technology, and education have proved to be successful so far, and we are hopeful that they continue on this path.

LS: Publishers will continue to explore and develop innovative business and content delivery models that meet subscriber demands for secure yet convenient access. One hopes there will be a better understanding by consumers regarding the importance of copyright—that it is the bedrock of creativity and the lifeblood of content-producing and curating industries without which copyright-based companies (like journal publishers, both commercial and noncommercial) will be unable to continue to produce the high-quality, peer-reviewed content upon which the audience for this journal, and more broadly, the scientific and scholarly community, have come to depend.

SV: Thank you both for taking the time to discuss your work and this topic.