copyright and licensing: two quick comments and a question

[Heather Morrison <heatherm@eln.bc.ca>]

greetings -

It is possible for publishers to ask authors to transfer copyright for
purposes of protecting the author's integrity, without limiting the
ability of authors to reuse their own work.  Charleston Advisor is an
excellent example - for details, see my note to the SPARC Open Access
Forum, Publisher Best Practices:  4.5 Stars for Charleston Advisor, at
https://mx2.arl.org/Lists/SPARC-OAForum/Message/1559.html

Contract law does trump copyright law, as others have pointed out -
however, the options are not just fair use / fair dealing under copyright
law or less.  It is also possible for copyright holders to be more
generous than they are required to be under copyright law.  My suggestion:  
when licensing, ask for fair use / fair dealing as a minimum.  If it makes
sense to ask for more rights, don't hesitate to do so.

Question:  will the kinds of skills that licensing specialists have
developed prove useful in helping to negotiate best copyright transfer
agreements on behalf of faculty?

cheers,

Heather G. Morrison