Copyright, Open Access and
re-use rights
Dr Jonathan Davies
AU Data Protection & Copyright Manager
Oct 2014
By ……..?
Main questions
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What do publishers want from you?
How do they do this and what is the document called?
What rights will they let you keep?
What limitations do they impose on people wanting to
re-use this work?
• What is the impact on OA policies?
• Can you do anything to change any of this, or comply
more effectively?
What do publishers want from you?
• In most cases, as much as they can legally secure by
getting you to sign the agreement document.
• Frequently this is the worst case scenario which
amounts to signing away ALL rights over the work
• A number of agreements are not quite this extreme and
these amount to a joint agreement over future use
• And everything in between!
What is it called?
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Publication Agreement (MIT)
Copyright Transfer Form (CUP)
Copyright and Consent Form
Confirmation of Copyright Transfer
Journal/Author Agreement
Copyright Assignment
Article publishing Agreement …
Elements
• Have to confirm you are the ‘sole owner’ or have authority
from other authors to assign/licence rights
• Have to confirm that there is no infringement of 3rd party
rights (i.e. all necessary permission have been acquired)
• Have to confirm it doesn’t break any other laws (e.g. libel)
• What they want you to hand over
• What rights/allowances they leave you with
• What else can be done with the work and or pre/post prints
etc (if you’re lucky!)
What rights will they let you keep?
• Written by lawyers FOR lawyers
• ‘Agreement’ suggests just that – a sharing of rights –
‘reserve for yourself a non-exclusive licence to …’
• Use in own teaching
• Re-publish in a book you author/edit
• Self-archive
• Occasional recognition of ‘moral rights’
• But …
What rights will they let you keep?
• Frequently these ‘agreements’ don’t vary much from the
circumstances where by you assign ALL of your
copyrights over to the publisher
• “I hereby assign to XXXX full copyright in all forms …”
• Usually, the author retains similar ‘rights’ but they are
often expressed in different ways, e.g. a table of what
post/pre prints you can archive
• Sometimes extra rights accorded – e.g. the right to
authorise someone else to copy the work for certain
purposes
What rights will they let you keep?
• Sometimes you are not expected to ‘transfer copyright’,
merely to ‘grant a licence’. But again, this practically
could amount to the same thing as previously
mentioned.
• ‘Devil is in the detail’ – so read the small print and be
aware of variations in allowances
Limitations on re-use/impact on OA
• NOT about what you can do, but the downstream effect
that this has on people who use any copies (you or the
publishers) make available and ultimately the notion of
OA.
• e.g. when can it be made available, to whom, what can
they do with it (print it out, use for teaching ..?)
• Frequently these details are not included in the
licence/agreement/transfer – deliberately?
Limitations on re-use/impact on OA
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What type of re-use might be allowed:
CC Licences?
e.g. CC BY-NC-ND
Other – not ‘branded’ licence but described in clauses in
the agreement or more often in separate document
List of CC Licences
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CC-0 [donated to public domain – no copyright]
CC-BY [remix, alter, tweak etc]
CC-BY-SA [as above, but must licence identically]
CC-BY-NC [as CC-BY but no commercial use]
CC-BY-NC-SA [as above but must licence identically]
CC-BY-ND [cannot change or extract parts]
CC-BY-NC-ND [as above but no commercial use]
(version number in brackets)
Why be concerned about all this now?
• Most research funding comes with the expectation of
Open Access – which means that at least the post-print
version (publishers’ PDF where possible) of your article
needs to be available for free within set embargo
periods
Who’s that?
• RCUK, Wellcome, European Research funding, and
now HEFCE, amongst others
• And Open Access doesn’t just mean “free-to-read”, it
also means “free-to-reuse”
• Currently only RCUK have been explicit about the
licence required – CC-BY- but all the others are
watching closely…(Wellcome insists on CC-BY when it
pays for an APC, for example)
Can you do anything to change
this?
• http://copyrighttoolbox.surf.nl/copyrighttoolbox/authors/licence/
• US advice? http://www.sparc.arl.org/resources/authors/addendum
• Alternative licences – in effect, a licence to publish and
no more.