There is lots of background chatter to see what negotiators at one publishing house can learn from those at another, but thus far there doesn’t appear to have emerged a standard set of terms or overall model from which to build these deals. Discussing LLM deals and partnerships with publishers.
(Schonfeld, Tracking the Licensing of Scholarly Content to LLMs)
Investigate the articles and documents about Cambridge University Press, Taylor & Francis, and Wiley’s approaches to use of published scholarship in emerging GenAI partnerships.
Consider the possible risks, tensions, and benefits with the approaches to publisher GenAI partnerships, including:
- Intellectual property and ownership
- Data and AI training models
- Privacy and liability
Complete this Activity
In the comments below, write a reflection on the publishers’ approaches to GenAI partnerships.
Generative AI (GenAI) is rapidly transforming how we conduct research, scholarship, and teaching and learning. Permitted use of GenAI in these areas is constantly shifting and dependent on the organizations or instituions for which you are engaging. Before sharing any outputs of your GenAI use, it is important to consult policies and guidelines on accepted use. To learn more, review the resources on GenerativeAI and Open Scholarship.
Photo by Emiliano Vittoriosi on Unsplash
Something that strikes me as I read is the sense of urgency around integrating or engaging with GenAI in some way. The technology evolves rapidly, and I appreciate the contrasting slow pace of research and writing. The publication process from production through marketing is a year or more. Many people read and edit and discuss the manuscript through all stages. This is in contrast to the race to be an innovator in GenAI integration. I don’t have anything prescriptive to say about that aspect. Something else that strikes me is Cambridge’s proposed 20 percent royalty for Ai licenses. I am curious how they arrive at this number–how is 20 percent determined to be fair? What is being provided by the publisher? Epubs, pdfs of the produced book? Given the long-term impacts of these licensing agreements–or even short term impacts–can’t be known, how is it they determine 20 percent for author and 80 percent for publisher is fair at this stage of the life of the book/research?
What a maze!
Perhaps the best approach right now is to wait.
It has me thinking more about copyright in publishing agreements. It’s so standard to give copyright ot the press etc., but with these new potential licensing deals etc., it’s worth re-thinking this standard. I wonder, too, is the concept of licensing and the royalty standards around that make sense in this context. The publishing paradigm is applied to GenAI licensing, but does that make sense? I’m curious about that.
I think use of Generative Artificial Intelligence, “a type of artificial intelligence (AI) that is able to create new content, such as text, images, music, or entire datasets” (The University of British Columbia Program for Open Scholarship and Education, 2025), can not only teach and equip students with knowledge of digital tools used for learning, but also create opportunities for facilitating and supporting students’ studies and their academic progress, excellence and achievements. Digital tools with open access, such as lecture slides and videos via emails and uploaded on Canvas, and Canvas announcements, discussions and files, can all be helpful and useful for students’ reviewing their learning materials, for ensuring accurate and comprehensive understanding of what they are learning, studying and their learning materials, and for providing convenient, easy and organized digital platforms for writing and co-construction of knowledge.
Christine Pan
Reference List
The University of British Columbia Program for Open Scholarship and Education. (2025, April 30). GenAI and Publishers’ Use of Scholarship. https://pose.open.ubc.ca/home-page/getting-started/generative-ai-and-open-scholarship/
These articles are very interesting reads! The relationship between large publishers and authors of research manuscripts already seems somewhat exploitative so I’m disappointed but not surprised that publishers are making deals with GenAI companies that bring them revenue. Calling it a “a win-win-win relationship among Wiley, its partners, and researchers” [“Wiley Creates AI Partnership Program”] seems like a stretch. I feel that any tools that might be developed might be put behind yet another paywall. It really hammers home the need to carefully read publishing contracts (something I definitely was not aware of as a graduate student trying to publish papers!). I wonder if use in AI is now more explicit in these contracts? I’m also curious if by making research open access, are we inevitably also making it available for training AI tools? The opt-in approach by CUP is an intriguing middle ground. But as a previous comment mentioned, how are the royalties fairly determined when there is really no precedent for this situation? It feels like the research community has a bit of catching up to do in regards to these issues.
From my understanding of the reading materials, Cambridge Press has asked authors for the use of their material in AI training while Taylor & Francis did not. I’m not clear on the approach/process by Wiley. The approach of Cambridge Press is more attuned to the first article and best practices for keeping respectful customer relationships. However, I’m not sure that Taylor & Francis has infringed on copyright? The unsavory approach may upset contributors but, at the end of the day, I don’t believe it will impact their bottom-line (especially when they are making many millions from the deal).
I’m most concerned about the point raised in one of the articles -information could be taken out of context and misinterpreted by AI-. There will be no expert checking the outputs and this feels like a looming disaster.