From: Joseph Esposito <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 19 Mar 2013 04:21:41 -0400

Course on Negotiations 101:  When you protest a clause but sign the
contract anyway, you are signalling to the other party what your
priorities are in making a deal. That other party will thus focus on
satisfying those priorities and those priorities alone, taking all the
other deal points off the table.  Effective negotiators pursue social
justice through the mechanisms of poker.

Joe Esposito


On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 9:44 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> From: "Sterk, J.M.E." <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Mon, 18 Mar 2013 11:10:20 +0000
>
> To sign a contract under protest has no legal value whatsoever. We do
> add to the email or letter we send together with the signed license a
> sentence stating that we de do not agree with the license. We do sign
> it in order to get access to the journal(s) for our patrons. Every
> time we subscribe to a new journal we discuss the same matter again
> prior to the receipt and signing of the license. It has little to no
> effect, but at least they are aware of our objections.
>
> Best regards,
>
> José Sterk
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Joseph Esposito <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2013 10:24:03 +0100
>
> Subject: Re: About Nature post-cancellation policy
>
> I can't speak to the particulars of Nature's contracts and know
> nothing about the fees, but what does it mean to sign a contract under
> protest? A contract is a contract.
>
> Joe Esposito
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 13, 2013 at 10:28 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > From: "Sterk, J.M.E." <[log in to unmask]>
> > Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2013 16:23:12 +0000
> >
> > Dear colleagues,
> >
> > Indeed, the new policy of charging an annual post-cancellation fee was
> > introduced in 2006. We did have long discussions with Nature, but in
> > the end we signed the licenses under protest. And each year with
> > renewals and new subscriptions we discussed it, again without result,
> > and we went ahead and signed under protest. The amount of the fee
> > however is not mentioned in the license. We had to ask specifically
> > and just recently received the overview of the different fees.
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > José Sterk
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Joseph Esposito <[log in to unmask]>
> > Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 11:12:17 +0100
> >
> > Were these cancellation fees stated in the contract your institution
> > originally signed?  I have never seen a Nature contract and am simply
> > wondering if this is new deal point raised after a contract has been
> > signed or something that was disclosed and agreed to up front.
> >
> > Joe Esposito