Is anyone stealing your articles? Exploding copyright myths

Abstract

Management of intellectual property rights, and copyright in particular, is usually handled by publishers on behalf of authors. However, many authors are worried about assigning copyright to publishers and are unclear about what this implies. This article looks at some of the common misconceptions about copyright and explains the truth behind the myths.

Keywords:

• Copyright
• Plagiarism
• Authorship

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Pippa Smart

Pippa Smart is a publishing consultant who provides training for editors and publishers, most notably the Medical Editors short course which takes place in Oxford in November each year. She also works with the Association of Learned, Professional and Scholarly Publishers (ALPSP) to develop training courses for publishers, such as a distance learning course on copyright that was launched in September 2012. She provides advice and consultancy services to a range of journals and publishers on how to develop their publishing practices and platforms, how to ensure that their agreements are appropriate, and how to improve the quality of their publications. For more information, see her website at www.pspconsulting.org.