The following mesage was originally sent to the people who are beta-testing my soon-to-be-launched History and Theory of Psychology E-Print Archive (HTP Prints, for short). Stevan thought it might be of interest to this group as well, and has asked me to forward it.
The "APA" mentioned in it is the American Psychological Association. To give you some background, historically the APA has been quite restrictive in their attitude toward electronic self-archiving. About two years ago they sent a note around to their (~150,000!) members and affiliates saying any paper that had been electronically posted would be considered "previously published" and therefore not eligible for consideration by any APA journal (there are dozens of them, and they are often the most influential journal in their particular field). In January 2001, however, they allowed authors of articles published in APA journals to post electronic versions THREE YEARS after they had been print-published. Then, just this past June, they revised their policy to allow authors to post their own articles to thei own personal website (but NOT to "third-party" sites, such as electronic archives) as soon as they had been accepted for publication. That ought to be enough to give you the flavor of the current situation in psychology. Regards, -- Christopher D. Green Department of Psychology York University Toronto, Ontario M3J 1P3 e-mail: [email protected] phone: 416-736-5115 ext. 66164 fax: 416-736-5814 http://www.yorku.ca/christo/ =================================== Folks, About 10 weeks ago I told you about my new History & Theory of Psychology E-Print Archive (HTP Prints -- http://htpprints.yorku.ca/). Several of you have since deposited documents, but some have also expressed concern over the possibility violating either copyright or APA publication policies by doing so. I am happy to announce that as of 1 June 2001, the APA has liberalized their policy regarding the posting of articles published in their journals on to the internet. The full policy can be found at http://www.apa.org/journals/posting.html. In essence it says that authors can post electronic copies of their own articles on their own websites as soon as the article has been accepted for publication in any APA-owned journal (such as History of Psychology), but not on third-party websites. At first glance, this might seem to exclude HTP Prints, but there is an easy way to obtain the benefits of posting on HTP Prints (e.g., wider distribution, easier access) without running afoul of the APA policy. First, post an electronic version of your article to your own website. Then, instead of posting your article directly to the HTP Prints site, post only a small web page containing a link to the version on your own website (see http://www.yorku.ca/christo/papers/Aristotle-link.htm for an example). In this way, the article itself will appear only on your own website, in accord with the APA policy, but a link to it will appear on the HTP Prints site. The link will be catalogued on the site accoring to author, topic, etc. so that users of the HTP Prints site will be able to locate the article just as easily as if it were on the site itself. In addition, a copy of the article's abstract and references will appear on the HTP Prints site as well to help users decide if they wish to read it. Note that this applies not only to future papers published in APA-owned journals, but also to any you have published in the past. The policy at Wiley (publisher of the Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences) is very similar (see Section C, Paragraph 1 of the Wiley "Copyright Transfer Agreement"). I am currently checking with Sage (publisher of Theory & Psychology and of History of the Human Sciences) to see what their latest policy is. I will let you know as soon as I find out myself. I encourage to take advantage of this opportunity as soon as possible. I will be officially launching the HTP Prints site at the APA Convention later this month (see the Fri. 5:00 Conversation Hour entitled, "Electronic Publication for History and Philosophy of Psychology" in Hilton Hotel Yosemite Rm. A). I very much hope to see your work on (or linked to) the HTP Prints site by that time. Best regards, -- Christopher D. Green Department of Psychology York University Toronto, Ontario M3J 1P3 e-mail: [email protected] phone: 416-736-5115 ext. 66164 fax: 416-736-5814 http://www.yorku.ca/christo/
