Law Faculty Publishing: A Guide

This information adapted from SPARC.

• The author is the copyright holder. As the author of a work you are the copyright holder unless and until you transfer the copyright to someone else in a signed agreement.
   
• Assigning your rights matters. Normally, the copyright holder possesses the exclusive rights of reproduction, distribution, public performance, public display, and modification of the original work. An author who has transferred copyright without retaining these rights must ask permission unless the use is one of the statutory exemptions in copyright law.
   
• The copyright holder controls the work. Decisions concerning use of the work, such as distribution, access, pricing, updates, and any use restrictions belong to the copyright holder. Authors who have transferred their copyright without retaining any rights may not be able to place the work on course Websites, copy it for students or colleagues, deposit the work in a public online archive, or reuse portions in a subsequent work. That’s why it is important to retain the rights you need.

Retain Your Author's Rights

This information adapted from SPARC.

Transferring copyright doesn’t have to be all or nothing. The law allows you to transfer copyright while holding back rights for yourself and others.  Some available options:

• Choose journals with non-exclusive agreements (more info: Open Access section)
• Choose journals with self-archiving friendly agreements (more info: Open Access section)
• Choose an Open Access Journal 
• Negotiate with the publisher to amend existing ageement (SPARC Author Addendum)
• Use an alternative agreement (Creative Commons License)

What if the Publisher Rejects the Author Addendum or Creative Commons License?

This information taken from SPARC.

• Explain to the publisher why it is important for you to retain the rights to your own work.
• Ask the publisher to articulate why the license rights provided under the SPARC Author Addendum or Creative Commons license are insufficient to allow publication.
• Evaluate the adequacy of the publisher’s response in light of the reasonable and growing need for authors to retain certain key rights to their works.
• Consider publishing with an organization that will facilitate the widest dissemination of their authors’ works, to help them fulfill their personal and professional goals as scholars.

Author Rights Links

Learn more from the experts