Developed by Richard White,
University of Otago | Ōtākou Whakaihu Waka | CC BY 4.0
These resources are intended for academic authors to help them understand the contracts they sign when publishing. The resources are aimed at authors who want to maximise their own rights and control of their own work, with a particular focus on open access. This is not a substitute for legal advice or talking to a publisher about the terms.
- Author rights checklist
- Copyright 101 for author rights (general rules)
- Decoding publishing contracts: key terms
- Sample Contracts
- Resources
Author rights checklist
This checklist provides a set of standard questions that researchers are commonly concerned about in publication agreements, presented in a table on the next page that can be printed and used during consultations with authors, or easily edited and customised to suit local policies and individual needs.
Some of the things an author might be interested in from their publication agreement.
- Am I still the copyright owner?*
- Can I put my AAM in the repository?
- Can I use my work in teaching?
- Can I reuse my work in other publications?
- Can I adapt or translate?
- Can I comply with a funder mandate?
- Can the publisher use my work for other purposes than publishing?
- Do I get a copy of my agreement?
- Is there a way to negotiate?
* This list starts from a presumption that the author/researcher is the copyright holder at the point of publication. This isn’t always the case, as employers or funders may assert rights.
Author rights checklist
The following table can be downloaded and printed off as a pdf or editable doc version:
Author rights checklist editable DOC
| Question | What the agreement / policy says (clause & summary) | Your rights for this article (Yes / No / Depends) | Conditions / notes (version, embargo, limits) | Action to take (follow‑up) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Am I still the copyright owner? | ||||
| Can I put my Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) in a repository? | ||||
| Can I use my work in teaching? | ||||
| Can I reuse my work in other publications? | ||||
| Can I adapt or translate my article? | ||||
| Can I comply with my funder’s open access or deposit mandate? | ||||
| Can the publisher use my work for other purposes than publishing it? | ||||
| Do I get a copy of my signed publication agreement? | ||||
| Is there a way to negotiate terms with the publisher or journal? |
Copyright 101 for author rights (general rules)
1. The flow of rights (university context)
Statute: Copyright is created by law. It’s treated as a property right.
Authors are first owners but if you’re an employee by default your employer owns copyright. This is variable by contract. Copyright is divisible, so rights can be held by different parties.
Intellectual Property (IP) Policy likely defines who owns the work in universities. Typically, IP policies grant copyright to authors but retain some rights under licence.
Author rights: so, authors only have copyright to the extent their employer grants it to them. They may not own all the rights.
Third parties (e.g. publishers): Authors then “pass” these rights to the publisher.
Key point: in a university context in AoNZ/AUS, authors are usually not the first owner of copyright. Rights are given to you and these are the rights you can assign or licence.
2. Authorship v Copyright Owner v Licensed Rights
Author: The person who created the work. This is an attribution and identity role.
Owner: The person or entity who holds the rights.
Key point: authorship is a “historical fact” – you can only give up your economic rights. If you sign a copyright transfer agreement, you are still the author of the paper, but you are no longer the owner of the copyright.
3. Moral Rights
These are the “human” rights attached to the work, separate from the commercial rights. They focus on the author’s reputation and relationship to the work.
- The right to be named as the author (attribution).
- The right to prevent “derogatory treatment.”
Key point: These rights stay with authorship. (You can waive these rights but can’t assign them to another party). If a contract tries to make you “transfer” your moral rights, it’s a red flag that the contract was drafted by someone who doesn’t understand your local law. Side note: this is what CC0 is for – waiving to the extent possible in law all the rights you can waive. This is distinct from public domain (no rights at all).
4. Licensed Rights
An owner of rights may license them to another party who can only do those things.
It is a grant of permission defined by contract.
- Exclusivity vs. Non-Exclusivity: if a licence is non-exclusive the owner can licence the same rights to another party. An exclusive licence is effectively the same as transfer of ownership.
- Sublicensing allows the licensee to give the rights to another party.
5. Co-authorship and the “agent.”
When multiple people write a paper, they often share copyright. The person who signs is legally acting as the agent for all the other authors.
Decoding publishing contracts: key terms
| Category | Term | What it means for the Author |
|---|---|---|
| Ownership | Grant of Rights / CTA | A Copyright Transfer Agreement transfers ownership; a Licence grants permission. |
| Ownership | Assignment vs. Licence | Assignment = transferring ownership. Licence = granting certain specific and limited rights. |
| Ownership | Exclusive vs. Non-exclusive | Exclusive = Only the licence holder can do those things. Non-exclusive = The owner of the rights can licence other parties to do those things. This may include sublicensing to another party. |
| Duration & Scope | Perpetual | What it says on the tin. |
| Duration & Scope | Irrevocable | The right cannot be taken away (unless agreed). |
| Duration & Scope | Worldwide | The publisher claims rights in every country. Standard for digital, but where print is involved there can be geographical restrictions. |
| Duration & Scope | Subject to Change | Allows the publisher to change terms. This is often stated without a requirement of notice. |
| Usage | Sublicence | Allows the party with the licence to give those rights to another party. |
| Usage | Digital/Format/Medium | Future-proofing for the publisher. Ensures they own your work regardless of whether it’s an e-book, app, or future technology. |
| Usage | Derivative/Adaptations | Rights to translate, create anthologies, or adapt your work into other media. |
| Usage | Embargo Periods | A waiting period (e.g., 12 months) within which you can’t exercise the associated right. |
| AI/Data | Tokenize / Vectorize | Grants the rights to use a work to train AI models. |
| Exit | Reversion of Rights | Clauses that would return rights to you under certain circumstances. |
Sample Contracts
Wiley (Example ELA/CTA): Wiley Licensing Info page has several useful examples:
- Example of Copyright Transfer Agreement (CTA)
- Example of Exclusive License Agreement (ELA)
- Example of License for Publishing CC BY This is an example of the Agreement that you will be asked to complete if your paper is
- Example of License for Publishing CC BY-NC-ND
Taylor & Francis An Agreement For The Transfer Of Copyright
Elsevier (Sample License): View PDF
SAGE (Sample Agreement): View PDF
An older one but interesting in that it mentions when you must seek permission for others’ copyright.
Springer Nature (Policy/License Info): Support Center
Great for understanding “Non-standard” rights (useful for government employees).
Resources
Bowrey, K., Cochrane, T., Hadley, M., McKeough, J., Pappalardo, K., & Weatherall, K. (2023). Managing ownership of copyright in research publications to increase the public benefits from research. Federal Law Review, 52(1), 3–33. https://doi.org/10.1177/0067205×231213676
“…revealed the shaky foundations of any assertion of ownership of copyright in university-affiliated research outputs, by any party in the research pipeline… Universities’ claim to ownership is theoretically strongly grounded in their status as employer … The copyright ownership claims of academic authors are weakened by IP policies that reserve certain rights to universities, and their status (where applicable) as employees. This in turn weakens the claims of publishers who purport to obtain ownership via assignments from researchers.” (Bowrey et al.)
Yuvaraj, J., and R. Giblin. (2021.) Are contracts enough? an empirical study of author rights in Australian publishing agreements. Melbourne University Law Review, 44(1), https://law.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/3638302/10-Yuvaraj-and-Giblin-380.pdf
Return to resources on rights retention