Re: FW: campus literary journal (Roegge, Kathleen)

[Ryan Jerving <jerving@xxxxxxx>]

Dear Kathleen Roegge,

I don't speak as a lawyer, but my sense is that at most higher education institutions, copyright stays in the hands of the individual creators of the work. At George Washington, where I work, for example, our copyright policy - which I think is fairly consistent with others - notes that "The University makes no claim of ownership of copyright in works of authorship created by members of the University community, unless such works qualify as 'Works Made for Hire' or involve 'Substantial Use' of University resources as defined below" (i.e., use of lab or a/v facilities, etc., in excess of what would normally be used by faculty, librarian, or student - I suppose it's an open question whether the school's server space you'll be using would be considered such). (You can see http://my.gwu.edu/files/policies/CopyrightPolicyFINAL.pdf, section 2.1.)

My thinking is that you would simply, somewhere in the front pages of the archive, make a note that copyright remains with the individual authors.

It might be the case that your journal would want to ask the authors to assign copyright to the journal, to facilitate handling outside requests for reprinting pieces, for instance, but it doesn't sound like that's what you're trying to do.

Please, anyone who knows better, correct me.

sincerely,



Ryan Jerving
Assistant Professor of Writing
University Writing Program
The George Washington University
801 22nd St. NW, Rome Hall 556
Washington, DC 20052

(202) 994-3854
jerving@xxxxxxx

----- Original Message -----
From: Olga Francois <OFrancois@xxxxxxxx>
Date: Thursday, September 7, 2006 2:15 pm
Subject: FW: campus literary journal (Roegge, Kathleen)
To: digital-copyright@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Roegge, Kathleen [
> Sent: Wednesday, September 06, 2006 4:59 PM
> To: digital-copyright@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: campus literary journal
> 
> Hi,
>     Our campus English Dept. publishes a journal each year containing
> poems, essays, stories, etc. written by students, faculty or staff.
> They want to create an online archive of past issues that would be
> available on the English department's website.  In the past there was 
> no
> formal agreement between the journal and the authors concerning
> copyright.  So who would the copyright holder be in the case of the
> items published in this journal, the department or the authors?  Thanks
> for any input.
> 
> 
> Kathleen Roegge
> Information Access Services Manager
> Brookens Library
> e-mail:  kroeg1@xxxxxxx
> phone: 6-6605
> 
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