Publishers' Rights and Wrongs in the Cyberage

Abstract:     
This comment argues that it is to the advantage of academic authors and institutions that employ them to assign copyright to journals that publish their work. It also argues that copyright is best left with those journals. On the flip side, it argues that at least some journals unduly limit the post-publication rights of academic authors and their employers. Failure to allow free reproduction of articles for distribution to authors' students and failure to permit authors to post copies of papers on campus websites sparks an increasingly hostile backlash for little apparent return to anyone.

Keywords: copyright, authors' and employers' rights, publishers' rights

JEL Classifications: K10, K39

Accepted Paper Series