Open Access

Creators of OA resources still can retain standard copyrights to their work. The same options exist when publishing through an open access channel as when an article is published through a controlled-access (or traditional subscription) model. Authors may be able to retain copyright or may be required to grant the journal publisher copyright. In either case, the article is still copyrighted, either by the author or the publisher.

For more information, consult Creator Resources from SPARC

Author Rights Resources: Details on securing author rights to published works.

How open is it Guide: outlines the core components of open access (e.g., reader rights, reuse rights, copyrights, author posting rights, etc.) across the continuum from “open access” to “restricted access”.

Even when self-publishing on the web, authors control copyright to their content. If authors and copyright holders wish to define and instruct readers about what they authorize them to do with this content, they can use a Creative Commons license. Creators may choose to require attribution and grant no commercial use. License definitions are pre-bundled in various combinations; you pick one of these license bundles from the Creative Commons menu.