CHING-LI CHAI   翟敬立

Here is a scan of the amended contract with Springer (private information redacted). The last Clause of the amendment, on Termination, states:
This Agreement shall be terminated on January 1, 2025 providing any of the three Editors has submitted a written request for a reversion of the copyright. Licenses in effect at that time shall be completely concluded.

About David Mumford Selected Papers Volume 2, On Algebraic Geometry, Including Correspondence with Alexander Grothendieck

• The copyright reverted to the editors in January 2025. You can Download the pdf file of the entire book for your personal use. You can also download the cover.
  
  
• Published in July 2010 by Springer Science+Business Media, ISBN 978-0-387-72491-1, xxii+767 pages, 99 USD. Click here to see a larger picture of the cover. (Do you see something unusual about the cover? Click here to check your observation and see other trivia.)
  
  
• Table of contents, Bibliogrpahy of David Mumford, Notes and comments.
  
  
• Further updates/corrections will be posted when we are aware of them. Please send your comments to the editors, Ching-Li Chai chai@math.upenn.edu, Amnon Neeman amnon.neeman@anu.edu.au and Takahiro Shiota shiota@math.kyoto-u.ac.jp.
  
  
• An electronic version will be available to the public free of charge after January 2025 when the copyright reverts to the author and the editors.
  
  
• The story/saga of the production of this book, which may be of interest to (prospective) authors of mathematical monographs.
  
  Looking back, the difficulties we experienced were both predictable and inevitable. The good old days when serving the scientific community was the primary objective of the publisher, reinforced by the legends of Julius Springer and his sons Ferdinand and Fritz, had been long gone since the late 1970's, when the CFO was made the director. When private equity firms took over the company, one can only expect the pursuit of higher profits and the abandonment of "service" to continue.
  • Springer was owned by the British private equity firms Candover and Cinven between 2003 and 2010. Candover and Cinven sold Springer to EQT Partners and the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation in February 2010 for 2.3 billion euros (including debts), making a total net profit of more than 170% of their initial investment of 600 milliion euros, while saddling the company with debts about 2.2 billion euros.
  • Follow up
    • In 2013, the British equity firm BC Partners acquired a majority stake in Springer from EQT and GIC for about 4.4 billion dollars.
    • In May 2015 Springer merged with Holtzbrinck (which owns Macmillan, Nature and Scientific American) to form "Springer Nature", with Holtzbrinck holding a majority 53% stake and BC Partners retained a 47% minority interest in the new company.
  
  
• The larger issue of scientific publishing in the digital age, including the preadatory practice by commercial publishers, is discussed in Wake Up!, a call for action in Mumford's blog post.
  • In the comments and response section, Mumford wrote ``He (Stuart Shieber) suggested that something like a phase transition would take place when a majority of scholars become aware of their being exploited. All it takes is mathematicians refusing to submit papers to commertical journals and demanding that their professional societies and university presses expand their publications. Your papers appearing in the Inventiones should be an embarrassment, like wearing a mink coat, not an honor."

Developments in Algebraic Geometry, a conference on research in algebraic geometry in directions initiated by David Mumford, June 2, 2007, Providence, RI.

• Online Application Form for support
• Procedures and forms for reimbursement
• Conference website