Copyright
Copyright is the form of intellectual property law (Title 17, US Code) that protects the rights and ownership of a creative work by it's creator. This applies only to creative works, purely factual information and works that required no creative effort are not covered by copyright. One of the most famous example of this is that a phone book is not covered by copyright. Copyright is a bundle of rights held by the author over how their work is used for a distinct period of time. In US law (17 U.S. Code § 106) these rights are:
- to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords
- to prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work
- to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale or other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending
- in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual works, to perform the copyrighted work publicly
- in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual work, to display the copyrighted work publicly
- in the case of sound recordings, to perform the copyrighted work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission
Once the period of time in which a work is under copyright has elapsed it enters the public domain and anyone can freely use these rights with your work. Under current law the period of time that an item is under copyright is death of the author plus 70 years, unless it was work made for hire or created under a pseudonym or anonymously in which case it is 95 years after first publishing or 120 years after first creation, whichever comes first. While historically in the United States copyright protections required notice to be legally valid, since the US joined the Berne Convention in 1988 copyright is now applied to all unique creative works as soon as they are created in a fixed format. You can still register your work with the US Copyright Office, which for enhanced protections of your rights and in legal claims.
Managing Your Copyright & Author Rights
As the creator of scholarly works you are the owner the that work's copyright, with the all of the privileges and responsibilities that entails. As such, you can chose whatever form or forms of distribution you desire for your work. You can also chose the kinds of privileges and restrictions attached to it and its usage.
This also means that as you seek to distribute your work you can enter into any agreements with a publisher you see fit. Many publishers will request that you assign your copyright to them as part of your publication agreement. It is up to you to decide whether or not their form of distribution is worth any fees or legal agreements they require. When you publish your work with a publisher you will need to license the right for them to make a copy of your work in their publication for subscribers or public access. This may entail assigning all of the rights to your work to them or it may simply be a license to distribute a copy of the work. If the publisher requires the copyright be assigned to them you can to attempt to negotiate a modified agreement retaining some rights or if you do not like that arrangement you can find a different publisher.
If you do assign your copyright to the publisher you must abide by the agreement you made with them and stay within the guidelines of whatever rights, privileges, and restrictions they allow. It is not inherently better or worse to assign your copyright to a publisher, but it does provide restrictions and guidelines to what you can do with that work. Though you may find the reach and prestige of the publisher to be worth the limitations to your personal use.
Creative Commons
A Creative Commons license is a copyright license that legally allows your work to be shared more easily. By distributing a work under a creative commons license you retain your copyright but clearly identify which of your rights to your work you wave in favor of allowing increased access and use of your work. These can include the rights to share, remix, and create commercial works from it as well as whether or not those derivates need to have the same the same type of license. You can also use a CC0 license to release your work directely into the public domain.
“Creative Commons License Spectrum” by Shaddim (CC BY)
Note Creative Commons licenses typically apply to the copyright laws of the United State, though Creative Commons has chapters in various countries that accounts for each country's unique copyright laws.
License and Attributions
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.