Deeplinks Blog posts about Open Access
On January 18, 2012, the Internet went dark. Hundreds of websites went black in protest of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA). The bills would have created a “blacklist” of censored websites based on accusations of copyright infringement. SOPA was en route to quietly passing. But when millions of Americans complained to their members of Congress, support for the bill quickly vanished. We called it the Internet at its best.
As we approach the fifth anniversary of the blackout, we also note a much sadder anniversary. A year after we beat SOPA, we lost one of the most active organizers behind the opposition. While being unfairly prosecuted under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, Aaron Swartz took his own life on January 11, 2013.
In February 2016, a team of scientists published one of the most important pieces of scientific research so far this century. For the first time, researchers had directly observed gravitational waves, ripples in the fabric of spacetime whose discovery Albert Einstein first predicted a century ago. The team effectively placed the last piece in the puzzle confirming Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity—in doing so, they took a giant leap forward in humans’ understanding of how the universe works.
Among the ways in which the Electronic Frontier Alliance supports the digital rights movement is amplifying creative grassroots tactics that concerned individuals around the country are using to promote digital civil liberties. By finding ways to demonstrate these principles within their community, even small groups can help shift cultural norms, as well as public policy.
The Free Culture Club, a student organization at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, is supporting creativity and access to knowledge by providing a repository of openly licensed intellectual works in a common campus space.
EFF works to inform the world about breaking issues in the world of technology policy and civil liberties. And one of our best ways of communicating with our friends and members is through our nearly-weekly newsletter, EFFector. Last week, we sent out a very special EFFector: a deep dive, single-issue edition that got into the nitty-gritty of open access and research. To keep the conversation going, we are publishing it here on the Deeplinks blog as well.
Did you miss it? Don't worry—you can sign up for EFFector here so you're never out of the loop again.
This Open Access Week, the global open access community has a lot to celebrate. Hundreds of universities around the world have adopted open access policies asking faculty to publish their research in open access journals or archive them in open repositories. A few years ago, open access publishing was barely recognized on the fringes of science; now, it’s mainstream. Three years after the White House’s groundbreaking open access memo, we may be on the verge of passing an open access law.
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