More freedom for authors

Transformation of Elsevier’s copyright policy allows Authors to:

• post final text of article to own websites;
• share the final text with peers world-wide;
• present papers without seeking permission;
• re-use published papers (wholly or partially).

Until recently, authors have been restricted from electronically circulating published papers. To improve this situation, some years ago Elsevier established the right of authors to circulate pre-print versions of their papers on specialised pre-print servers and then to post the published versions of their papers on their institutions' secure internal websites.

Recently, Elsevier copyright policy was further transformed allowing authors to use their published papers more broadly. We discussed this change with Mark Seeley, General Counsel for Elsevier.

Simplified access
This latest development in copyright policy gives authors the right, without having to seek permission, to post the published versions of their papers (the manuscript versions updated to reflect edits) on their personal websites and on their institutions' external websites. The "final version" is the author's Word (or TeX or similar word processing) file, which can be updated by the author to incorporate changes made during the peer-review and editing processes.

"The only requirements are that the paper must be accompanied by a link to the home page of the journal of publication, and that the paper must not be used for commercial purposes," says Seeley. Commercial purposes include systematic distribution or creating links for commercial customers to articles.

Balancing act
"It is always difficult to find the right balance of what is good for the author and what is good for the journal of publication," explains Seeley. "We think this policy change is good for both since authors can increase awareness of their work while we can continue to attract excellent authors to our journals."

For authors, the main improvements to come from the policy change concern scientific advancement and scholarly communication. A side effect is an increase in authors' educational use of their papers.

Scientific advancement
Authors can present their papers at meetings or conferences without having to seek permission to use the material. As well, papers can be reused either in whole or in part for a thesis or dissertation, or for a published collection of works. Hence, advancing the research described in published papers is made more straightforward for authors.

"Even though some authors have not known it, both presenting papers and reusing papers have been existing rights for several years," explains Seeley. "We see this new copyright policy and the way issues like these are clarified as a way to further empower the authoring community."

Scholarly communication
This policy allows authors to share the published version of the paper, either in print or in electronic format, with research colleagues and peers world wide, addressing the core of authors' needs. Scholarly communication, the backbone of scientific advancement, is made less complicated and authors have greater opportunity to discuss their papers in their scholarly and scientific communities.

Educational use
The way is open for increased author comfort when developing courses or lectures using their published papers. Although some publishers have more restrictive copyright policies, authors of Elsevier-published papers have long been allowed to use them, either in print or in electronic format, for courses or for classroom teaching. "This has been allowed for a long time," explains Seeley, "even though some authors have assumed it was not."

Many benefits
"Don't forget that this copyright policy aligns with the institutional repositories model of open access putting the creation of a body of information in the hands of authors and their institutions," says Seeley.

An author receives significant acknowledgement when their paper is published in a reputable journal. Most authors want to take this further and use their papers more widely for professional reasons. Elsevier’s newest copyright policy allows it.

Please send responses to this article to editorsupdate@elsevier.com.