by Janet Salmons, PhD

An unassuming post on LinkedIn asked “Have you ever published with Taylor & Francis, Routledge, CRC Press, F1000 or Dove Medical Press? If so the rights for AI to harvest your work have been sold to Microsoft which it will use to power MS Co-Pilot.”

Really. Funny thing, I never heard a peep about this from Routledge, even though I have three books published with them. I wrote to ask what the heck is going on, and received this response from a Taylor & Francis/Routledge Editor:

Taylor & Francis has entered into agreements with two AI companies to provide access to our content for training. This is considered a fundamental aspect of a publisher’s role, working on behalf of authors to ensure their ideas make the fullest possible contribution, and it’s consistent with our author agreements. Our standard publishing contracts do not enable authors to opt out from a specific use of their content (whether that is for AI or Text and Data Mining (TDM) or other types of licensing opportunity).

Money talks. So do writers!

Since I don’t think chewing my work up and spitting it out in bits will make a contribution, here is my response:

I don’t understand how deals with two AI companies are consistent with author agreements when large language models were not in existence when I signed contracts for the books I’ve published with Taylor & Francis (or with Stylus, which was acquired by Routledge). I did not agree to give my work to billionaires who pay millions of dollars for “content” and let writers and artists scramble for crumbs if they get anything at all. I did not agree to have my work fragmented into bits, taken out of context, and mixed with random garbage scraped off the Internet (or stolen from other authors.)

To say that generative AI contributes in any way toward making a contribution ignores the fundamental integrity of scholarly work. Let me explain, since you have apparently forgotten.

In a scholarly article we start by introducing a problem or question, defining the issues and contexts, and explaining why they are important. Then we offer foundations: who has studied this problem before and what did they learn? Next, we lay out our own research process, helping readers understand theoretical frameworks, ethical safeguards, methodologies, and methods. After we share what we discovered we discuss the results. It is all of a logically-flowing piece. It is only published after editors and peer reviewers offer careful scrutiny and all revisions are made. Years of academic study and research come to fruition in each scholarly article.

Similarly, years of effort go into texts and academic books. We must do extensive research and careful thinking before we put words on the page. We work to develop a well-organized book, with sequential chapters, glossaries, and appendices that fit together. We work through an extensive process of editing and copy-editing before the book is published.

Let’s use Learning to Collaborate, Collaborating to Learn (2019) as an example. I started developing models of the collaborative process as a consultant. I used those models as a foundation for my doctoral research, completed in 2006. I subsequently gave numerous presentations about the models and incorporated them into team leadership courses in MBA and doctoral programs. I continued to develop and refine the approaches and materials, resulting in the 2019 book. I created all of the figures and graphics. In other words, 20 years of scholarly, practical, and academic work went into Learning to Collaborate, Collaborating to Learn! This work was adapted for a student audience in another Routledge book, Reframing and Rethinking Collaboration in Higher Education and Beyond, co-authored with Dr. Narelle Lemon.

A taxonomy is central both books. By definition, taxonomies represent the scientific process of classifying and grouping related things. It is not possible to understand and use the Taxonomy of Collaboration by finding one piece of information or out-of-context excerpt. For the “fullest possible contribution” you need the whole system. In other words, you need the books in their entirety, as they were intended to be read.

I hope these brief explanations help you to grasp why scholarly books and articles are more than “content” to sell in bits, without the explicit permission of authors. I would like to re-negotiate my contract to exclude my books from this sale.

Sincerely,

Janet Salmons

Clearly, scholarly writing is no more than bits of content to be sold word-by-word.

I have been going back and forth with the Global Editorial Director, Social Sciences Books, who does not want his name used. The bottom line is:

• Taylor & Francis/Routledge saw no need to inform writers, let alone ask permission or offer us the ability to opt-out.
• Contracts (crafted before the advent of Generative AI) offer no avenues to opt-out of any deal they decide to make.
• It is too late. “I’m afraid that your content has already been submitted to both of these AI deals and that there is now no possibility of withdrawing it.”

He suggested that “guardrails” were put into place, which is laughable. This recent example in a New York Times article about AI in the classroom nailed it:

“For one particular assignment related to the novel ‘Persepolis,’ I had students research prophets,” [the teacher] explained, because the main character fantasizes about being a prophet. But, she told me via email, internet searches that incorporated A.I.: Gave students jewels such as “the Christian prophet Moses got chocolate stains out of T-shirts” — I guess rather than Moses got water out of a rock(?). And let me tell you, eighth graders wrote that down as their response. They did not come up to me and ask, “Is that correct? Moses is known for getting chocolate stains out of T-shirts?” They simply do not have the background knowledge or indeed the intellectual stamina to question unlikely responses.

I guess fragments of my books will be spit out in similarly misleading hallucinations. If my name is included, then my reputation as a scholar is called into question. What amount of royalties can compensate me for damage to my reputation? How will they figure royalties on work that has been chopped into bits? I am not holding my breath in anticipation of a piece of the $10 million.

I did not spend years researching and developing this material, creating all original figures, to have it used in this way. I would never have agreed to this usage if it had been in the original agreements. Clearly, I am not alone in my outrage about the implications of this deal:

• Taylor & Francis AI Deal Sets ‘Worrying Precedent’ for Academic Publishing
  “Barbeau said what disturbs her the most “is that there’s so little agency given to the authors about how their work is going to be shared and presented to the world,” which underscores the already “predatory” nature of academic publishing.”
• An academic publisher has struck an AI data deal with Microsoft – without their authors’ knowledge
  “the authors of the content do not appear to have been asked or even informed about the deal. What’s more, they say they had no opportunity to opt out of the deal, and will not see any money from it.”
• Academic authors ‘shocked’ after Taylor & Francis sells access to their research to Microsoft AI
  “I only found out about this via word of mouth in the past few days. I was shocked that they had not publicised this more widely to their authors, as the use of AI and LLMs is a prominent concern for academic researchers today.”
• Microsoft’s Secret AI Publishing Deal Sparks Outrage Among Academics
  “An agreement allowing Microsoft to train its AI models on Taylor & Francis’s extensive catalog of scholarly publications has garnered severe criticism from academics, who say they were kept in the dark about the deal.”

I am interested to know whether other authors have communicated with Taylor & Francis/Routledge about this issue.

Now what?

Looking ahead, academic writers face a real dilemma. How can we protect the integrity of our work? To be continued!

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Reposted with permission. Originally posted on Salmons.blog.

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Janet Salmons, PhD
I’m a free-range scholar, qualitative methodologist, writer, and artist. Follow my posts, register for events, or get in touch on Linked In. Find my books with Sage Publishing and my books with Routledge. I am a scholar in residence at the Center for Advanced Internet Studies in Bochum, Germany from April to June of 2024. I previously served as the Research Community Manager for Sage Methodspace, where I wrote about research designs and methods, and ways to teach and guide researchers, and share results. I also conduct interviews with researchers and offer webinars. When I am not engaged with writing about research, I enjoy art journaling, watercolor, and other creative activities. I occasionally run creativity groups or offer art workshops.