Scholars who are over 80 years old persist in defending their rights, and this well-known online full-text database has once again been pushed to the forefront. Du Nan education teacher noticed that this company, which was born in the name of "China's Knowledge Infrastructure Project" and is still written on the homepage of official website, has been sued by the author of the article for alleged copyright infringement for many times in recent years, and it has also been listed on the bulletin boards of many universities and city public libraries for greatly increasing the price of database services and reducing the types of electronic journals whose full text can be searched. The society expects HowNet to innovate its business philosophy and find a new balance between profit-making and public welfare.
"Just Needed" Databases of Many Cultural Institutions
The establishment of China Knowledge Network is related to the "China National Knowledge Infrastructure" (CNKI) project initiated by Tongfang, Tsinghua and Tsinghua on 1999, aiming at realizing the dissemination, enjoyment and value-added utilization of knowledge resources in the whole society. Tongfang Wang Zhi (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. was established in 2004, and is currently one of the holding subsidiaries of Tongfang, a A-share listed company. China Academic Journal (CD-ROM Edition) Electronic Magazine Co., Ltd., the organizer behind China HowNet portal, with the registration number of1997; In 20 14, its enterprise type was changed from "ownership by the whole people" to "limited liability company (sole proprietorship by legal person)".
According to the 2020 annual report of Tongfang Co., Ltd., the education teacher of Du Nan learned that in 2020, the main business income of Tongfang Wang Zhi Company was1167,580,700 yuan, with a gross profit margin of 53.93%.
Behind the high income is a very high market share. In fact, electronic database products such as China HowNet, China Knowledge Resource Database, Chinese academic journal database, China doctoral dissertation database, China Yearbook full-text database, China reference book online publishing database, and services such as internet search, * * sharing and online publishing of knowledge resources have long been "just needed" by domestic universities, research institutes and academic readers.
Screenshot of Tongfang Wangzhi's revenue report disclosed in the 2020 annual report of Tongfang Co., Ltd., a listed company.
Du Nan education teachers log on to China government procurement website and find that as of June 65438+February 1 1, urban public libraries in many regions have completed the procurement of data services of China HowNet in the next year.
For example, the Digital Library of Weifang Library in Shandong Province ordered two databases, namely "Journal" and "Doctoral and Master's Thesis" of China Knowledge Network at a price of 229,950 yuan. In 2022, Yingkou Library of Liaoning Province invested 99,000 yuan to complete the database procurement of China HowNet. In addition, the Sichuan Science and Technology Resources Sharing Service Platform provided a procurement budget of 250,000 yuan for ordering CNKI in 2022; Jiujiang Library of Jiangxi Province plans to purchase "China HowNet Public Cultural Service Platform" with 40,000 yuan. At present, the procurement project has been officially announced for comments.
Compared with local public institutions, colleges and universities have a greater demand for China HowNet. Among them, Fudan University's "China HowNet (2022) CNKI Database Single Source Purchasing Announcement" shows that the school purchased China HowNet (2022) CNKI database from the supplier Tongfang HowNet (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd., and the bid (transaction) amount was 825,000 yuan, requiring HowNet to provide the ordered online 7×24 hours in addition to regular system maintenance.
From the purchasing results of some universities, we can also get a glimpse of the dependence of teachers and students on HowNet database. For example, the library of Shenyang University of Technology purchased 26 Chinese databases in 2022, and the winning bid (transaction) amount was 3,067,080 yuan, of which CNKI China Wang Zhi 1 package alone paid 690,000 yuan to Tongfang Wang Zhi (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd., accounting for 22.5% of the total purchase amount.
Accused of "outrageous price increases and content cuts"
Education teachers in Du Nan have learned that the database of China HowNet, which can be used for novelty retrieval of academic achievements, duplicate retrieval of dissertations and other fields, is not without competitors, but it has actually become the first choice of many academic users because it enjoys a number of exclusive publishing agreements.
It is often regarded as a kind of "welfare" that a university can provide teachers and students with the right to download the full text of HowNet database and realize the real-time circulation of academic documents. However, in the past decade, many universities and institutions have issued statements pointing out that their prices have risen too fast and the service content has decreased, which has caused HowNet to fall into the dispute of "shopkeepers bullying customers".
65438+February 1 1, Du Nan education teachers found through keyword search that the earlier "stop protest" available at present came from Nanjing Normal University. The library of this school issued a notice on February 3, 20 12, saying: "Because the price of CNKI China HowNet database vendor is too high, the use agreement has not been reached so far. June 20th 1 3rd to1October1Sunday, database platform (including periodicals, newspapers, conferences and
2065438+In June 2004, the Library of Jinling Institute of Science and Technology informed all colleges (departments) and departments that the contract between the Library and Tongfang Wang Zhi Science and Technology Co., Ltd. had expired, and a new round of procurement agreement had been negotiated for three months. "No agreement was reached because the company raised the price excessively and reduced the service content", but the library is still trying to actively communicate and negotiate with the service providers.
Some organizations are welcome. For example, on 2016,6543810.5, a paper in the library of Wuhan University of Technology claimed that the price increase in Wang Zhi was outrageous, and provided a series of data: since 2000, the quotation of Tongfang Wang Zhi for this school has increased by more than 10% every year, especially 20 12.
The statement wrote that the negotiation between the university library and HowNet Company is a game: "Although the full-text download of China HowNet database is temporarily stopped, which brings inconvenience to readers, the negotiation of safeguarding the rights and interests of the school is equally important ... The support of teachers and students is the strong backing of the library, please understand."
Peking University Library has also informed readers that it may stop using the HowNet database because of its "high price increase".
On March 3 1 of the same year, Peking University Library also publicly released the Notice of Possible Service Interruption of China HowNet, which had a great social impact. The notice also pointed out that the reason why the school may not renew CNKI in time is that "the price of database vendors is too high" and the school is unwilling to compromise easily. If readers can't access the series databases of China HowNet at that time, it is suggested to choose other databases of the same type, open access databases and paper resources.
Guangzhou Library has been providing HowNet database to the public for many years, but on March 25, 2009, the library also publicized the change of HowNet's reduced service content. According to the explanation of Guangzhou Library, in 20 18, HowNet and some periodical publishers implemented a new publishing cooperation mode-unified publishing of paper and online periodicals. During this period, HowNet merged the online and paper publications of 2 12 periodicals, and spun them off from the Database of Chinese Academic Journals (Online Edition). By 20 19, the number of periodicals increased to 355, which is expected to be in 2009. Therefore, readers of Guangzhou Public Library Service System will no longer be able to download the full texts of these periodicals. Among these journals stripped from the full-text download range, there are many core journals in the fields of geography, public health in China, international news, and journals in universities such as Tsinghua University, Nanjing University, Wuhan University and Huazhong University of Science and Technology.
Teachers of education in Du Nan have noticed that most of the above-mentioned incidents of "stopping using HowNet" ended soon after the subscription was resumed, but new cases are still emerging. While some academic institutions update the HowNet database, some universities reduce their dependence on the HowNet database.
From June 5438 to June 2023 10, Jimei University Library announced that due to the rising price of HowNet database resources and budget reasons, the library recently adjusted its subscription plan on the basis of statistical analysis and expert argumentation on resource utilization. In 2023, the school will renew the academic journals, yearbook database and big data research platform of China HowNet, add personal journals, basic education journals, academic journals and fine literature journals, and will not renew the doctoral dissertations, patents and citation databases. Readers are advised to make good use of other platforms as a supplement.
Du Nan instant products.
Hou Jingjing, a southern education teacher, wrote an article.
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