Publisher gives authors copyright

A medical publisher has changed its copyright policy to ease the process for authors to comply with the federal public access mandate. Starting today (May 1), authors will automatically retain copyright of manuscripts submitted to Rockefeller University Press journals, according to an linkurl:editorial;http://www.jcb.org/cgi/content/full/jcb.200804037 published yesterday in the Journal of Cell Biology. Giving copyrights to authors streamlines the process of submitting articles to PubMed Central within 12 months of acceptance for publication, as a federal linkurl:mandate;http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/54028/ passed this year requires. Under the traditional model of publishing, authors give copyrights to a journal forever. In order for authors to comply with the new mandate they have to negotiate with journals to retain copyright. While Rockefeller University Press will continue to require readers to pay for articles for six months after publication, they will now do so under a license from the author. After six months, a linkurl:creative commons;http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/53977/ license will take...