From: John Cox <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2014 11:22:29 +0100

I am afraid that it is not as simple as Sandy indicates.  Copyright
registration in the USA is no longer necessary, as the USA has acceded to
the Bern Convention.  It is useful evidence of US copyright ownership, but
non-registration does not mean that there is not a copyright holder that can
enforce his/her copyright, in whatever jurisdiction the copyright was
created.  Moreover, copyright registration is not required in other
countries; it is peculiar to the USA.

As a scholarly and scientific publisher based outside the USA, but with many
customers in the USA, we never bothered to seek copyright registration in
the USA.  It simply was not necessary, even if we were to seek copyright
protection in the US courts.

John Cox
Rookwood, Bradden
Towcester, Northants NN12 8ED
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0) 1327 861184
Mobile: +44 (0) 7763 341356
E-mail: [log in to unmask]


-----Original Message-----

From: Sandy Thatcher <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Sun, 6 Apr 2014 22:42:08 -0500

There is a simple way to find out who owns the copyright. Check with the
Copyright Office, which can be done online. Most publishers register their
copyrights in both books and journals. You don't need to take the
publishers' word for it.

Sandy Thatcher


At 8:00 PM -0400 4/6/14, LIBLICENSE wrote:
>
> From: "Hamaker, Charles" <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Fri, 4 Apr 2014 05:21:43 +0000
>
> Uniform transfers of copyright obviously make publishers' lives' simpler.
>
> And to standardize rights that those contracts by authors might
> invoke, publishers have taken to demanding, in contracts with
> institutions, that the institution acknowledge the publisher owns the
> copyright, or has  proprietary content on their website . Once this
> untruth is acknowledged, there's no need to PROVE the publisher owns
> anything.  Authorial emendations to contracts are meaningless in this
> context.  The institution signing signals they agree and the publisher
> - if they ever decided to take the institution to court for violating
> license terms - need only waive the forced "acknowledge" statement in
> the judge's face and poof -variable author contracts, CC-BY, OA
> contracts, etc. all disappear from the discussion.
>
> In fact for the individual institution being sued, the actual facts of
> authorial negotiations magically disappear. Dr. O'Donnell is
> absolutely right to question and refuse to sign a contract that
> eviscerates his rights. But publishers have the answer to individually
> negotiated authorial contracts.   So not only do most authors of those
> articles and reviews and book chapters not see a dime from
> CCC/publisher "subsidiary rights," but libraries are in essence
> enjoined from even asking if the publisher can prove ownership of a
> specific article should push come to shove.
>
> Chuck
> ________________________________________
>
> From: Joseph Esposito <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Thu, 3 Apr 2014 10:48:24 -0400
>
> Chuck,
>
> Surely some CCC revenue ends up with authors, but CCC is not in a
> position to know.  I am not defending (or attacking) CCC in saying
> this; I'm simply trying to explain how it works.  CCC collects revenue
> and remits a portion of that to the publishers of the content used.
> CCC does not have access to the contracts that publishers have with
> authors.  The CCC revenue is accounted for by publishers as subsidiary
> rights income.  That income may or not be split (evenly or unevenly)
> with authors.  It depends on the individual contract.  As a gross
> generalization, most journal articles are not royalty-bearing for
> authors, but most books are.  The number of exceptions and
> qualifications to what I just wrote is endless.
>
> Joe Esposito