Papers from Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, fro

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 This archive contains 18,592 scientific publications totaling 33GiB, all from Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society and which should be available to everyone at no cost, but most have previously only been made available at high prices through paywall gatekeepers like JSTOR. Limited access to the documents here is typically sold for $19 USD per article, though some of the older ones are available as cheaply as $8. Purchasing access to this collection one article at a time would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Also included is the basic factual metadata allowing you to locate works by title, author, or publication date, and a checksum file to allow you to check for corruption. ef8c02959e947d7f4e4699f399ade838431692d972661f145b782c2fa3ebcc6a sha256sum.txt I've had these files for a long time, but I've been afraid that if I published them I would be subject to unjust legal harassment by those who profit from controlling access to these works. I now feel that I've been making the wrong decision. On July 19th 2011, Aaron Swartz was criminally charged by the US Attorney General's office for, effectively, downloading too many academic papers from JSTOR. Academic publishing is an odd system—the authors are not paid for their writing, nor are the peer reviewers (they're just more unpaid academics), and in some fields even the journal editors are unpaid. Sometimes the authors must even pay the publishers. And yet scientific publications are some of the most outrageously expensive pieces of literature you can buy. In the past, the high access fees supported the costly mechanical reproduction of niche paper journals, but online distribution has mostly made this function obsolete. As far as I can tell, the money paid for access today serves little significant purpose except to perpetuate dead business models. The "publish or perish" pressure in academia gives the authors an impossibly weak negotiating position, and the existing system has enormous inertia. Those with the most power to change the system--the long-tenured luminary scholars whose works give legitimacy and prestige to the journals, rather than the other way around--are the least impacted by its failures. They are supported by institutions who invisibly provide access to all of the resources they need. And as the journals depend on them, they may ask for alterations to the standard contract without risking their career on the loss of a publication offer. Many don't even realize the extent to which academic work is inaccessible to the general public, nor do they realize what sort of work is being done outside universities that would benefit by it. Large publishers are now able to purchase the political clout needed to abuse the narrow commercial scope of copyright protection, extending it to completely inapplicable areas: slavish reproductions of historic documents and art, for example, and exploiting the labors of unpaid scientists. They're even able to make the taxpayers pay for their attacks on free society by pursuing criminal prosecution (copyright has classically been a civil matter) and by burdening public institutions with outrageous subscription fees. Copyright is a legal fiction representing a narrow compromise: we give up some of our natural right to exchange information in exchange for creating an economic incentive to author, so that we may all enjoy more works. When publishers abuse the system to prop up their existence, when they misrepresent the extent of copyright coverage, when they use threats of frivolous litigation to suppress the dissemination of publicly owned works, they are stealing from everyone else. Several years ago I came into possession, through rather boring and lawful means, of a large collection of JSTOR documents. These particular documents are the historic back archives of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society—a prestigious scientific journal with a history extending back to the 1600s. The portion of the collection included in this archive, ones published prior to 1923 and therefore obviously in the public domain, total some 18,592 papers and 33 gigabytes of data. The documents are part of the shared heritage of all mankind, and are rightfully in the public domain, but they are not available freely. Instead the articles are available at $19 each--for one month's viewing, by one person, on one computer. It's a steal. From you. When I received these documents I had grand plans of uploading them to Wikipedia's sister site for reference works, Wikisource— where they could be tightly interlinked with Wikipedia, providing interesting historical context to the encyclopedia articles. For example, Uranus was discovered in 1781 by William Herschel; why not take a look at the paper where he originally disclosed his discovery? (Or one of the several follow on publications about its satellites, or the dozens of other papers he authored?) But I soon found the reality of the situation to be less than appealing: publishing the documents freely was likely to bring frivolous litigation from the publishers. As in many other cases, I could expect them to claim that their slavish reproduction—scanning the documents— created a new copyright interest. Or that distributing the documents complete with the trivial watermarks they added constituted unlawful copying of that mark. They might even pursue strawman criminal charges claiming that whoever obtained the files must have violated some kind of anti-hacking laws. In my discreet inquiry, I was unable to find anyone willing to cover the potentially unbounded legal costs I risked, even though the only unlawful action here is the fraudulent misuse of copyright by JSTOR and the Royal Society to withhold access from the public to that which is legally and morally everyone's property. In the meantime, and to great fanfare as part of their 350th anniversary, the RSOL opened up "free" access to their historic archives—but "free" only meant "with many odious terms", and access was limited to about 100 articles. All too often journals, galleries, and museums are becoming not disseminators of knowledge—as their lofty mission statements suggest—but censors of knowledge, because censoring is the one thing they do better than the Internet does. Stewardship and curation are valuable functions, but their value is negative when there is only one steward and one curator, whose judgment reigns supreme as the final word on what everyone else sees and knows. If their recommendations have value they can be heeded without the coercive abuse of copyright to silence competition. The liberal dissemination of knowledge is essential to scientific inquiry. More than in any other area, the application of restrictive copyright is inappropriate for academic works: there is no sticky question of how to pay authors or reviewers, as the publishers are already not paying them. And unlike 'mere' works of entertainment, liberal access to scientific work impacts the well-being of all mankind. Our continued survival may even depend on it. If I can remove even one dollar of ill-gained income from a poisonous industry which acts to suppress scientific and historic understanding, then whatever personal cost I suffer will be justified—it will be one less dollar spent in the war against knowledge. One less dollar spent lobbying for laws that make downloading too many scientific papers a crime. I had considered releasing this collection anonymously, but others pointed out that the obviously overzealous prosecutors of Aaron Swartz would probably accuse him of it and add it to their growing list of ridiculous charges. This didn't sit well with my conscience, and I generally believe that anything worth doing is worth attaching your name to. I'm interested in hearing about any enjoyable discoveries or even useful applications which come of this archive. - ---- Greg Maxwell - July 20th 2011 [email protected] /* */ Bitcoin: 14csFEJHk3SYbkBmajyJ3ktpsd2TmwDEBb -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.11 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAk4nlfwACgkQrIWTYrBBO/pK4QCfV/voN6IdZRU36Vy3xAedUMfz rJcAoNF4/QTdxYscvF2nklJdMzXFDwtF =YlVR -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

udp://tracker.openbittorrent.com:80
udp://open.demonii.com:1337
udp://tracker.coppersurfer.tk:6969
udp://exodus.desync.com:6969

 gmaxwell_ (2011-07-21)

Unfortunately this torrent file was created with a rather poor selection of trackers and pirate bay won't let me change it or upload another version.
If it's not working well for you, try the torrent at http://www.btghost.com/link/89818739/ which is the same swarm but it just has more configured trackers.

4Anarchy (2011-07-21)

Can someone upload this to scribd and Archive.org to make every single entry easy to find by searchengines like google ?

lxsl (2011-07-21)

These are the actions of a hero. I am so seeding this.

4Anarchy (2011-07-21)

Ok, will try to upload this to Archive.org and Scribd to make it esay to find using google. Might take some months to do so with my slow home connection and using TOR (dont want to get sued by this asholes for sharing free Data).

lxsl (2011-07-21)

The church of kopimism issued a preacher

sirspamlost (2011-07-21)

Mr. Maxwell, I applaud you.
I have often myself run into the pay walls of JSTOR, Sage, Springer and the like (most universities can not afford to subscribe to all journals).
I am therefore well acquainted with the frustration of having science made purposely inaccessible to me - science that was in many instances first paid by society and then price tagged to increase the profits of the few.
I sincerely hope that your actions, as well of those of Aaron Swartz herald the beginning of the end for the illegitimate business of exclusionary science publishing.

ehabkost (2011-07-21)

I don't know if this is a problem only to me, but encoding issues broke the PGP signature.
In case other people are not being able to verify the signature, I fixed the encoding in a way that the signature is valid, and copied it here:
http://pastebin.com/KudE4bWr

kode (2011-07-22)

You, sir, are a hero.

Igneous_X4 (2011-07-22)

Thank you.

Ibu_ISO (2011-07-22)

I love the 21st Century!

4Anarchy (2011-07-22)

Arg, this stuff is image files in PDF, not searchable. Not good for publishing this cause searchengine does not index...

 gmaxwell_ (2011-07-22)

4Anarchy, Indeed! And because many of the documents are old and have arcane english they don't OCR well, at least not with any of the free OCR software.
You can contribute to the effort of making the documents available by helping to solve these problems. :)

vomitols (2011-07-22)

Thanks gmaxwell, great work!

ic0n0 (2011-07-22)

this is exactly the sort of content that should be published on a peer-to-peer hosting network (like freenet, but accessible to all without extra software).

4Anarchy (2011-07-22)

@gmaxwell_ will try what i can do, perhaps some of the commercial OCR sofware performs better. Will try Abby, if it works going to upload it on scribd and providing new torrent.
This may take some time...

snakeatwar (2011-07-22)

Maxwell, you are a HERO! I hope that more news companies publish your story and your cause! You have my support! I'm planning on contacting FreePress to alert them of this highly important issue!

Fallstaff (2011-07-22)

Kudos sir! This is a truly excellent effort and a blow to those who would privatize humanity's birthright.

whatmfC (2011-07-22)

Just added a 100Mbps unlimited seed at the moment, enjoy everybody !

samwilsonau (2011-07-22)

The Wikisource project relating to these is (if anyone's looking for some fun proofreading!).

WillKane (2011-07-22)

Wow!
This is the embodiment of what knowledge file sharing truly is.
Many thanks for spreading knowledge and files that will further many people's educational opportunities.

dr.applepie (2011-07-22)

damn, i wanna seed this but dont wanna download :D oh well, maybe i have to, this is so great job.

smejniy (2011-07-23)

Thank you Greg!

Astrohacker (2011-07-23)

I tried downloading, but my software says that the tracker says "file not found." Any idea what's wrong?

lotekmachine (2011-07-23)

one of the best torrents and releases ive seen in a long long time... good job

iinlane (2011-07-23)

I recently got an invitation of publishing to an open journal that let's me keep the copyright. Initially I thought I skip this as I don't have time but now I think I will find the time.

Twitch852 (2011-07-23)

Quote
"The documents are part of the shared heritage of all mankind, and are rightfully in the public domain,"
"the fraudulent misuse of copyright by JSTOR and the Royal Society to withhold access from the public to that which is legally and morally everyone's property."
/Quote
I thank you and I'm sure William Herschel thanks you, as I would think he would of enjoyed a larger audience than his research
has been allowed.

Digital_Exc (2011-07-23)

Although I think that data such as this should always be free to read and research, I would not go as far to say that JSTOR is abusing copyright: building and maintaining a database costs and continues to cost money. You can't blame a business for trying to earn a buck..
Comes the question: should a business like JSTOR be the custodian of such important papers? I think not. It should be maintained in a Wiki-website manor or even government subsidized way.
I applaud your efforts, now let's see if there are people willing to create a searchable website for these valuable documents.

pilton125 (2011-07-24)

Added a 1Gbit seed

 Mbb15 (2011-07-24)

tweakers ftw

flatbush71 (2011-07-24)

Thank You sir. Let the bells of freedom ring
!

baloo2.1 (2011-07-24)

P2P at it's best for sure. I will of course seed this for at least a 5:1 ratio.
Just one question: is there a "proper" way to access the documents? They seem to be "split and compressed" in a way I'm not familiar with, with a metafile directory and a PDF ditto.

MC-1984 (2011-07-24)

Hero. Knowledge is salvation.

fktr (2011-07-25)

science must never be a hostage to business. if we have come to that point, it's time to change the system, NOT to lock science!

freddy213809 (2011-07-25)

I am downloading just to seed and support freedom of information. Though I might take a peek at a few articles out of curiosity :P

soufriere (2011-07-25)

Greg, thank you. There are a few very excited historians of science this weekend.

Subol107 (2011-07-25)

I'm not a scientist but am D/L this on principle.

Ocarina654 (2011-07-25)

You are a hero.

Phat-Tony (2011-07-25)

Bravo

lordnin (2011-07-25)

Thank you, gmaxwell. I'll be saving this in my archives. Hopefully, some friends of mine will be able to use this as well.

R4DK0 (2011-07-26)

Added a 200Mbps seed.

BlackGin (2011-07-26)

I like it that way :P

RamboUlf (2011-07-27)

Lysande manifestation - stöd den och laddar ner filen själv för att åter ge fri information till samhället. Forskning är enligt min uppfattning i syfte att föra samhället, civilisationen framåt och bör finnas till för alla att tillgå.

5ynic (2011-07-27)

I'm not a scientist, But I am seeding, and will continue to seed as long as there's demand. Agree 99.9% with Greg's manifesto. Let's jimmy this system open, and keep it as open as it can be. As a hobby I write short science fiction stories, and often I just want to check a fact or check the date or name of the person who made a particular discovery, and I can't because with (very few) exceptions, the journals are closed and require a subscription... a subscription that would in no way feed into the scientific process - just go to some electronic publishing house (R-E, mostly).
Yarrrrrr.

mon_dieu (2011-07-27)

Well, I guess there is nothing else to do other than seed this forever.
thank you kind sir.

wstn (2011-07-28)

I really think there should be a pirate's answer to Mendeley

oleg_lego (2011-07-30)

I found a some Metadata files with extra HTML in them, and in a couple of cases, there was no metadata at all. Here's a list of them:
00\00061867.txt
00\00061867.txt
00\00383084.txt
00\00383084.txt
00\00428395.txt
00\00428395.txt
00\00646843.txt
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00\00766483.txt
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00\00840268.txt
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00\00968604.txt
00\00968604.txt
01\01098845.txt
01\01098845.txt
01\01141826.txt
01\01141826.txt
01\01257775.txt
01\01257775.txt
01\01346866.txt
01\01346866.txt
01\01583205.txt
01\01583205.txt
01\01820439.txt
01\01820439.txt
01\01837015.txt
01\01837015.txt
01\01928080.txt
01\01928080.txt
01\01958921.txt
01\01958921.txt
02\02332564.txt
02\02332564.txt
02\02336508.txt
02\02336508.txt
02\02521708.txt
02\02521708.txt
02\02756444.txt
02\02756444.txt
02\02897126.txt
02\02897126.txt
03\03021430.txt
03\03021430.txt
03\03060903.txt
03\03060903.txt
03\03167253.txt
03\03167253.txt
03\03182391.txt
03\03182391.txt
03\03219222.txt
03\03219222.txt
03\03537555.txt
03\03537555.txt
03\03798273.txt
03\03798273.txt
03\03805926.txt
03\03805926.txt
03\03834658.txt
03\03834658.txt
04\04003963.txt
04\04003963.txt
04\04045210.txt
04\04045210.txt
04\04087945.txt
04\04087945.txt
04\04121199.txt
04\04121199.txt
04\04123442.txt
04\04123442.txt
04\04125431.txt
04\04125431.txt
04\04131515.txt
04\04131515.txt
04\04914768.txt
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04\04920301.txt
04\04920301.txt
04\04923239.txt
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05\05235139.txt
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05\05273908.txt
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05\05331431.txt
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05\05350975.txt
05\05350975.txt
05\05634733.txt
05\05634733.txt
05\05699956.txt
05\05699956.txt
06\06185549.txt
06\06185549.txt
06\06280921.txt
06\06280921.txt
06\06439434.txt
06\06439434.txt
06\06582445.txt
06\06582445.txt
06\06791943.txt
06\06791943.txt
06\06863060.txt
06\06863060.txt
06\06919063.txt
06\06919063.txt
07\07267827.txt
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07\07587204.txt
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07\07674101.txt
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07\07674203.txt
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07\07706411.txt
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07\07772878.txt
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07\07902756.txt
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07\07969359.txt
07\07969359.txt
08\08036655.txt
08\08036655.txt
08\08344213.txt
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08\08457572.txt
08\08457572.txt
08\08524728.txt
08\08524728.txt
08\08603087.txt
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08\08772116.txt
08\08772116.txt
09\09062759.txt
09\09062759.txt
09\09087581.txt
09\09087581.txt
09\09288919.txt
09\09288919.txt
09\09547263.txt
09\09547263.txt
09\09608531.txt
09\09608531.txt
09\09637558.txt
09\09637558.txt
09\09904714.txt
09\09904714.txt
09\09942174.txt
09\09942174.txt

oleg_lego (2011-07-30)

oops... there are a lot of duplicates in that list. I neglected to specify the full tag in the grep, and then did not run it through unique.
Sorry!
I am in the process of writing software to allow a lookup by subject substrings, author, and perhapd a fe more criteria. The organization as it stands is terrible, and I am considering renaming all the files to reflect volume and page number.
If anyone has any suggestions, I'm all ears.

twenty8twelve (2011-08-03)

Want to download and seed but have the crappiest net with a crap "fair usage" policy when it comes to downloads.
Anyhoo - I applaud you \o/

thom (2011-08-04)

As stated before; DL o seed just for the cause! Simple as that. Bravo to gmax, well played.

leoboiko (2011-09-08)

JSTOR is now freeing _part of_ their public domain content
It's something, I suppose. Congrats Greg.

sazoman79 (2011-09-17)

Hello, I just Downloaded this and was wondering what everyone is Using to expand this Files>??? Thanks in advance to everyone!!!

sazoman79 (2011-09-27)

Hello once more, i forgot to mention that I have a Mac comp and there's no default settings for unarchiving this Documents and would like a little on doing so. Thank you in advance.

onehottmin (2011-10-01)

@sazoman79 here you go

for more options you can go here
http://www.7-zip.org/download.html

opredeleno (2011-10-10)

ENORMOUS upload. Literally AND figuratively. As a newbie in the field of science I can only bow before this effort.

monfas (2012-02-05)

Hi, Thanks to all you that made this available.
Any one knows how to use the Metadata? I want to be able to run searches. Is it necessary any software?

Tripled (2012-07-02)

I am certainly glad John Young (Cryptome) follows the Tor* mailing lists, or else i would probably never have come across this!
I would like to know though if the file numbering scheme was a 'mistake' and there never was a "10.7z or there is a 10.7z but it is 'missing'
Cheers and thank Greg!
Tripled

kerenskyy (2012-07-04)

heh, I got here via cryptome as well. good stuff.
Cheers.

ajaxian12 (2013-01-13)

RIP Aaron. You are fucking hero

Hallowlibra (2013-01-13)

RIP Aaron.

MusicalMonkey (2013-01-13)

RIP

MusicalMonkey (2013-01-13)

also, cheers for UL.
the new generation stand upon the shoulders of giants.
yet, dwindled our wealth to riches of the whored.

bleargh (2013-01-13)

Brilliant upload and thoughtful rationale. Many thanks for this. For those who care, a fair amount of the non-PD portions of these journals can be found on rutracker; search for Royal Society.

otto420 (2013-01-13)

I do not know what is contained but I believe that information in all its forms should be free. So I will d/l and seed until people have had their fill.

TheColdTruth (2013-01-14)

If someone had access to JSTOR, what would a systematic way to continue this archive?
Someone AIM at me.

itsame (2013-01-14)

And me

Anomalous (2013-01-15)

I got this from you in July 2011 (TYVM). When I learned of Aaron's death, I searched for JSTOR and got no hits -- so I thought the torrent had died, and I reupped it. It just seemed like the right thing to do at the moment. I had no intention to steal your work. Sorry.

turnkit2084 (2013-01-16)

Someone was asking how to contribute PD JSTOR docs ... here's an answer: http://aaronsw.archiveteam.org/

bloodcircle (2014-09-08)

good lord he has near 30,000 in bitcoins, untouched.
:o