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Editorial

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D-Lib Magazine
November 2006

Volume 12 Number 11

ISSN 1082-9873

Balancing the Rights of Authors and Publishers


In this issue of D-Lib Magazine, you will find an article by Peter Hirtle, who was Associate Editor of this magazine for two years (from June 1999 to May 2001). Among his other responsibilities, he currently serves as the Intellectual Property Officer for the Cornell University Library.

Peter's article describes an analysis he has done concerning various forms of addenda that enable authors to retain some rights in their works, provided the addendum is acceptable to the publisher of the journal in which the author's work will be published. Although Peter has looked at several types of author addenda, he has limited his discussion to five addenda that "are likely to be legally binding". Whether or not such addenda become widely accepted by publishers remains to be seen, but Peter's article presents the problems and possible solutions in a thorough and thoughtful way.

Also in this issue, in the "In the News" section, you can find an October 25 press release from SURF and JISC [1] entitled "Balancing rights and interests in the digital age". (A link to the license to which the press release refers can be found at the SURF "Copyright Toolbox" web page at <http://www.surf.nl/copyrighttoolbox/authors/>.)

Scholarly publishing has been undergoing many changes and facing many challenges over the past few years. Some of those challenges are being met with innovative solutions, and others have proven more intractable. As a community we need to work towards a solution that balances the rights of both authors and publishers while simultaneously realizing the advances in access and collaboration enabled by continuing technological advances.

Bonita Wilson
Editor

 


[1] SURF is the Dutch higher education and research partnership organisation for network services and information and communications technology. JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) is a joint committee of the UK further and higher education funding bodies and is responsible for supporting the innovative use of information and communication technology (ICT) to support learning, teaching, and research.

Copyright© 2006 Corporation for National Research Initiatives

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doi:10.1045/november2006-editorial