A cartel of publishers, amongst whom I am very sorry to see Brill, has come together to shut down Researchgate. The cartel consists of ACS Publications, Brill, Elsevier, Wiley and Wolters Kluwer. These are companies that control quite a section of indological publishing.

Springer is not part of the cartel, and is holding separate talks with Researchgate. There is hope that they may come to some agreement.

I am not surprised to see the industry moving against open research in this way. The free circulation of the creative work of academics is obviously a direct threat to their revenues. They depend entirely upon us to create research output, and then give them all our rights so they can profit from from our work. I know there are other points of view on this issue, but I have thought about this as much as many people, and I take the position I take.

Best,

Dominik Wujastyk

References:

the new cartel's website: http://www.responsiblesharing.org/
Springer Nature: http://group.springernature.com/gp/group/media/press-releases/researchgate-and-springer-nature-plan-cooperation-/15118294

Professor Dominik Wujastyk

Singhmar Chair in Classical Indian Society and Polity

Department of History and Classics

University of Alberta, Canada

South Asia at the U of A:

sas.ualberta.ca