Friday, September 16, 2011

Dangers of Handing Over Copyright


According to the World Intellectual Property Organization copyright law exists 

to encourage a dynamic culture, while returning value to creators so that they can lead a dignified economic existence, and to provide widespread, affordable access to content for the public.”

However, have you ever thought about what it means when instead of giving a publisher a licence to reproduce your work, you give them your copyright? Essentially you will not be able to reprint that piece in your collected works, or include any part of it in related works or put it on your website. You will not receive any fees should it be translated or adapted in any way. In fact to use your own work, you will have to ask the publishers permission and risk refusal! And this is when you will have done all the work and other academics will have carried out the refereeing process. So think about it before you sign the copyright form and at the very least, ask for permission to place your authors version on your institutional repository or website.

Free Resources


Free resources are generally thin on the ground so a timely article in Online by Barbie Keiser giving comprehensive coverage to a range of  free resources from Thomson Reuters . A section of the website is entitled Additional Free Resources and is broken down into Scholarly Literature, IP& Standards and Life Sciences. 
The website is worth looking at but two are definitely worth mentioning. Scholarly Literature gives you access to the master database of all the journal titles in Thomson Reuters scientific databases. Here you can recommend that a particular journal be included for indexing.
Science Watch (www.sciencewatch.com) provides access to all science metrics and analysis that track trends and performances in global research. Also Fast Breaking Papers, New Hot Papers, Emerging Research Fronts and Fast Movving Fronts
Full article Keiser, B.: Free Scientific Resources from Thomson Reuters, Online, July-August, 2011, pp.23-27.