Research Publication, Open Access and Rights Retention Policy

The Research Publication and Open Access Policy does not apply to any third-party content included within your published article/chapter and in the Author Accepted Manuscript that will be deposited onto UDORA and openly available under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) licence 4.0. It would be desirable for all the third-party content to be shared under the same licence conditions as the rest of your research, but if the rightsholder will not allow this then it is possible to include their work under a more restrictive licence. You can include third-party content (such as photographs, diagrams) that are covered under a more restrictive Creative Commons licence, or the default copyright statement of © All Rights Reserved, or indeed has zero or no licence within your research article, which will be published under a CC-BY licence.

The guidance below looks into this in more detail, however this is not legal advice and the responsibility for obtaining written copyright permissions or licences to use any third-party content lies fully with the author. For more information about copyright please refer to the Copyright Guide for students and staff.  

Third-party content is any material that has been created by or belongs to someone else. This can include illustrations, photographs, maps, long text excerpts. These works are usually automatically protected by copyright. This can also include any of your previous published works if you have signed a Copyright Transfer Agreement or an Exclusive Licence to Publish contract with a publisher. 

There are a number of ways that you can copy third-party material within your work legally. You can:

1. Seek written copyright permission from the rightsholder. You would need to be clear about your purpose and explain about the Open Access (OA) conditions of your Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) on UDORA and also explain what the conditions of your published version will be too. 
2. Use third-party content which is not under copyright protection. This could be because the copyright protection has expired and is now in the public domain. Alternatively it could be because the creator has given up their copyright, doesn't want attribution and has put their work in the public domain - this is commonly referred to as Creative Commons Zero or CC0.
3. Use licenced material such as works with a Creative Commons licence or Open Government Licence. Make sure that your usage fits the terms and conditions of the licence. If your purpose is not within the licence conditions, you will need to seek written copyright permission. 
4. Check for a 'Rights and Permissions' link near the published online article. Some US publishers such as Elsevier or Sage have an agreement with the Copyright Clearance Center called Rightslink. If you want to re-use any diagrams or tables, etc. within a journal article then click on the link and fill out the form. Dependant upon your use there may charge you for a licence. 
5. Use the copyright exception "Criticism, Review, Quotation and News Reporting (S30, Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988). You would have to ensure that your use is fair (legal term: fair dealing) and you have used no more than is necessary to make your point. This exception only applies to previously published works. There would need to be evidence of a discussion about the third-party material. You must provide sufficient acknowledgement of the author and source. You would need to use an insubstantial amount, however there is no statutory definition on substantial and therefore you would need to decide if the amount you have used is lawful or infringes copyright. As there is an element of risk involved with using copyright exceptions and fair dealing it would be best to discuss with your publisher your intentions.

If you need to request copyright permission to include any third-party content in your work, you need to be clear what material you want to use; where your works will be published; when this will take place, and how the material will be viewed and used. 

You will need to explain that the third-party content will be used both in a published paper and in the AAM which will be deposited onto UDORA and openly accessible under a CC-BY Licence. 

Please see the following template as a guide.

If you have been denied copyright permission to use the third-party content in your paper then you must not use it. This also applies if you have not received a response to your request. No response = no permission.

If you have been granted copyright permission to use the third-party content within your open access version, but the rightsholder wants a more restrictive licence than CC BY, you could:

• Include the third-party content as per the rightsholder's requirements, such as a different Creative Commons licence, or with an 'all rights reserved' notice. Clearly indicate within your manuscript (either with a caption near the item, or in the list of credits) the copyright holder and the terms under which the third-party content has been released. Assert that the CC-BY licence does not apply to this content. If the rightsholder has requested a specific form of attribution, you must abide by this. Here is an example:
  • [Title of image], © [Rightsholder, (year)], All Rights Reserved. Permission for re-use should be sought from the rightsholder.

Please read the useful guide from OAPEN Open Access Books Toolkit for more information.

If you have been unable to secure permission from the rightsholder for third-party content within your Author Accepted Manuscript with a CC-BY licence, then you can either:

• Decide not to use the material at all.
• Redact the material from the AAM that will be deposited onto UDORA. Check to make sure that this will not affect the coherency of your work. If you go-ahead with removing the third-party content make sure that you either include brief descriptions / links / references to the removed content to make your work more comprehensible.
• Consider opting out of the Publication and Open Access Policy. You will still need to deposit your AAM into UDORA but you could apply a different Creative Commons licence or you could embargo your work for a certain period of time. In this situation please consult of 'Opting Out' part of this Guide and please contact rightsretention@derby.ac.uk. 

Further information about exceptional circumstances can be found in the FAQs section of this guide.

If you are in receipt of funding from a grant organisation such as Wellcome Trust or UKRI, you would need to check the grant conditions to ensure that you are compliant. 

The UKRI (UK Research and Innovation) have produced a guidance document called "Managing third-party copyright for research publications" to help researchers who are in receipt of UKRI funding, manage third-party copyright to comply with UKRI's OA policy. This explains what to do if you are including third-party content in your book chapter, monograph and edited collections in OA publications, but could also be applicable for journal articles too. Whilst this was primarily written for UKRI grantees, it provides some very good approaches for researchers who want to know how to manage third-party content within their research. 

Another useful source of information is the JISC guide to publishing under the UKRI open access policy: copyright and Creative Commons licences.