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Current Events Open Access Talk The online event series Open Access Talk discusses topics related to Open Access. Online Courses On the TOERN platform, we offer online courses in German and English on the topic of open access. With a user account, certificates for the courses can be obtained. Workshops The Workshops focus on specific questions relating to OA and are oriented towards the needs of the OA community. Past Events Train the Trainer The Train the Trainer taught training methods and didactic skills for Open Access multipliers. Thematic Workshops The Workshops focused on specific questions relating to OA and are oriented towards the needs and information deficits of the OA community....

Intro Pathways to Open Access Source: open-access.network (2021), Pathways of Open Access ( CC BY 4.0 International ) The key takeaways from this article are 1 Basically, a distinction can be made between pathways to open access (green and gold) and financing options for open access (with or without publication charges). An additional pathway – diamond open access – is also often mentioned. 2 Green open access (also known as self -archiving) refers to making previously published works (possibly also the preprint or post-print version) freely available to the public in an institutional or disciplinary repository, or sometimes on the author’s personal website. 3 Gold open access refers to the publication of scholarly works in open access journals, as open access monographs, or as contributions to open access collections. As a rule, these works undergo the same quality-assurance process as closed access publications. Diamond open access is a subtype of gold open access that is financed without publication charges. Diamond open access publishing often has a community-driven, non-commercial background Green Open Access Source: Based on Oberländer, A. (2020). Open Access – Es ist nicht alles Gold, was glänzt. In: Open Science. Von Daten zu Publikationen. Zenodo. https://zenodo.org/records/4018594 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Green open access – also known as self-archiving – refers to making a work published with a publisher available to the public in an institutional or disciplinary open access repository . It is sometimes understood to refer also to making such a work available on the author’s personal website. Self-archiving can take place at the same time as the publication of the content by the publisher or at a later date, and is possible for preprints and post-prints of scholarly articles, as well as for other document types, for example, monographs, research reports, and conference proceedings. "Zweitveröffentlichungsservices an Hochschulen. Bericht zur Erhebung" [Self-Archiving Services at Higher Education Institutions: A Report on the Survey] The report summarises key results of a survey conducted within the framework of the project open-access.network. Preprint and Post-Print Source: Shafee, T. (2020). Typical publishing workflow for an academic journal article (preprint, postprint, and published) with open access sharing rights per SHERPA/RoMEO. Own work; adapted from diagram by Ginny Barbour Wikimedia Commons ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Preprints Find an introduction here. A preprint is a scholarly publication that has not (yet) undergone peer review, which means that the quality of the work has not yet been conclusively assessed. The manuscript version of a text submitted for publication to a journal or a publisher is sometimes also referred to as a preprint. In contrast to a preprint, a post-print is a text that has already undergone peer review and has been accepted for publication. There are two types of post-prints. On the one hand, a post-print may be completely identical with the publisher's version, or the version of record . On the other hand, the content may be the same, but the formatting, layout, or pagination may be different. In the latter case, the post-print is referred to as the author’s accepted manuscript (AAM) version. The willingness of publishers to allow self-archiving of post-prints or preprints varies considerably. The Open Policy Finder database provides an overview of the rights that publishers grant their authors in this regard. Under German copyright law, authors are allowed under certain conditions to make post-prints available to the public, irrespective of whether the publisher agrees to this. This is known as the Zweitveröffentlichungsrecht . Practical tip Looking for a suitable repository? Lists of open access repositories can be found in the Directory of Open Access Repositories (Open DOAR) and the Registry of Open Access Repositories (ROAR). Variants of Green Open Access In discussions on open access, three ways of providing green open access are distinguished. First, the works can be made available in institutional repositories. In this case, authors have the possibility of depositing their scientific texts on a trans-disciplinary document server operated by their institution (e.g., university). Second, the works may be made available in disciplinary repositories – that is, repositories that host output from a particular subject area (e.g., a specialist discipline), irrespective of the institutions to which the authors belong. A third variant is to deposit scholarly documents on one’s own personal website. However, this approach means that the deposited documents are not, as a rule, as visible as they would be if they were archived in an institutional or disciplinary repository. Moreover, their long-term availability is not assured, which is why this type of self-archiving is often not recognised as open access. This is the case, for example, in the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities . A list of open access repositories can be found in the Directory of Open Access Repositories ( OpenDOAR ) and in the Registry of Open Access Repositories ( ROAR ). Gold Open Access Open access publishing – also known as gold open access – refers to the first publication of scholarly works as articles in open access journals , as open access monographs , or as contributions to open access edited volumes or conference proceedings. These texts usually undergo the same quality assurance process as closed access works, mostly in the form of peer review or editorial review. As a rule, a publishing agreement is concluded with the publisher. It specifies the rights of use that the author grants to the publisher, and the conditions of use that shall apply to the open access documents. Such agreements are often supplemented with an open access publication licence under which the authors can grant users more extensive and precisely specified rights. Source: Based on Oberländer, A. (2020). Open Access – Es ist nicht alles Gold, was glänzt. In: Open Science. Von Daten zu Publikationen. Zenodo. https://zenodo.org/records/4018594 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Financing Both open access and closed access publications have to be financed. The options for financing open access publications are comparable to those used to finance closed access publications: sales of printed copies; unpaid support from the scientific community, scientific institutions, and volunteers; and advertising or sponsoring. Sometimes cross-financing also occurs. In particular, commercial publishers that want to try out the gold open access business model finance new journals with revenue from their subscription business . Although publication fees , or article processing charges (APCs; in the case of monographs, book processing charges, BPCs), are sometimes cited as a typical gold open access financing model, they are also widespread in closed access publishing ( Gutknecht, 2018 ). APCs are payable per accepted and published article and can be combined with institutional memberships. If publishing authors belong to an institution that has an institutional membership with an open access publisher, that institution will cover the publication fees in full or in part. In addition, many institutions provide further possibilities of reimbursement of these costs, for example, via publication funds . Research Funders and Open Access Find an introduction here. Business Models for Open Access Books Find an introduction here. Business Models for Open Access Journals Find an introduction here. Video on the Funding of Open Access Articles Source: Becklas Dorow, C., Hauss, J. (2026). Funding Open Access Articles – What Are the Options?. Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB), open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/73596 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Video zur Finanzierung von Open-Access-Monographien Quelle: Becklas Dorow, C., Hauss, J. (2026). Open-Access-Artikel finanzieren – welche Wege gibt es?. Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB), open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/73319 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Diamond Open Access If an open access publication does without APCs entirely – in other words, if it is free of charge for readers and does not charge authors a fee to publish – this special type of gold open access is also referred to as diamond open access . In addition, diamond open access publishing often has a community-driven, non-commercial background. More information on the relationship between diamond and gold open access, and a discussion of the various definitions of diamond open access, can be found in Dellmann et al. (2022) . The project CRAFT-OA ( Armengou et al., 2024 ) has proposed a broader definition of diamond open access. The “OA Diamond Journals Study” by Bosman et al. (2021) discussed the potential and challenges of such publishing formats – especially for journals – and showed that diamond open access journals often rely on voluntary work and usually finance their publications via consortial models, institutional funding, crowdfunding, or membership models (see pp. 117–118). Overviews of the German and Swiss diamond open access landscapes can be found in Hahn et al. (2022) and Taubert et al. (2024) , respectively. To promote diamond open access as a fair, scholar-led, non-commercial variant of open access, and to link up initiatives, UNESCO initiated the Global Diamond Open Access Alliance in 2024. At EU level, the Council of the European Union has recommended that diamond open access be promoted ( Council of the European Union, 2023 ). For Germany, the German Research Foundation (DFG) issued a call for proposals in 2024 to establish a national service centre for diamond open access. Diamond Open Access Standard (DOAS) Der Diamond Open Access Standard formuliert Qualitätskriterien für Diamond-Zeitschriften. Er wurde vom DIAMAS-Projekt erarbeitet. Source: Based on Oberländer, A. (2020). Open Access – Es ist nicht alles Gold, was glänzt. In: Open Science. Von Daten zu Publikationen. Zenodo. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4018594 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Akteure der Diamond-Open-Access-Community: Sechs Akteursgruppen und ihre individuellen Beiträge zu einem fairen und gemeinschaftlichen Diamond Open Access. Quelle: Henkes, L. M., & Holscher Blackman, K. (2025). Wissenschaftliches Publizieren neu denken. Blaupause für gemeinschaftliches und faires Diamond Open Access. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17240865 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Middle Ways There are also gradual intermediate positions between gold and green open access. For example, the social science repository Social Science Research Network (SSRN) allows authors both to make their already published journal articles available in open access and to post and share the preprint versions of their manuscripts and submit them to SSRN partner journals. The epijournals , or overlay journals ( Gowers, 2015 ), in mathematics are another example. These are open access journals that use the infrastructure of preprint servers or repositories. Authors deposit the preprint versions of their manuscripts in arXiv or Hyper Articles en Ligne (HAL) and then submit them for publication to one of the epijournals. If a submission is accepted after peer review, the original preprint version continues to remain available alongside the publisher’s version. Some Copernicus Publications and F1000 journals operate according to a similar principle, with open peer review. Closed access publishers use arXiv in a similar way by enabling manuscripts deposited there to be automatically ingested into their own submission workflows. Depositing a preprint of an article in an open access repository before publishing it with a publisher also has characteristics of gold and green open access. Publishing documents such as dissertations or publication series for the first time in a repository is also a kind of hybrid form of gold and green open access. Because the works are being published for the first time, the publication can be regarded as gold open access. However, publication takes place in repositories, which are normally used to provide green open access to works. Besides green and gold open access publications, other variants are sometimes assigned colour symbols, too ( Piwowar et al., 2018 ; Schmeja, 2018 ). These publications may not be open access in the strict sense, for example, when a journal article can be read free of charge but is not reusable in the long term. Video zum Open-Access-Regenbogen Quelle: Schmeja, S. (2020). Der Open-Access-Regenbogen, open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/49667 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Open Access Publishing Find an introduction here. Where and How to Publish Open Access? Here is an introduction to open access. Open Access Helpdesk Ask your specific questions about open access here. Forum Do you have a question? Would you like to discuss open access-related aspects with others? Please feel free to use our forum. References Armengou, C., Bargheer, M., Gingold, A., Holsinger, S., Laakso, M., Mitchell, D., Mounier, P., Pölönen, J., Rooryck, J., Ševkušić, M., Souyioultzoglou, I., & Varachkina, H. (2024). Operational Diamond OA criteria for journals . DIAMAS and CRAFT-OA projects. https://zenodo.org/records/12721408 Bosman, J., Frantsvåg, J. E., Kramer, B., Langlais, P.-C., & Proudman, V. (2021). OA Diamond Journals Study. Part 1: Findings. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4558704 . Council of the European Union (2023). Council conclusions on high-quality, transparent, open, trustworthy and equitable scholarly publishing. Dellmann, S., van Edig, X., Rücknagel, J., & Schmeja, S. (2022). Facetten eines Missverständnisses. o-bib 9 (3). https://doi.org/10.5282/o-bib/5849 Gowers, T. (2015, September 10). Discrete Analysis - an arXiv overlay journal. Gowers’s Weblog . https://gowers.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/discrete-analysis-an-arxiv-overlay-journal Gutknecht, C. (2018, January 8). Publikationskosten für Closed-Access: die verschwiegenen APCs. Wisspub.net . https://wisspub.net/2018/01/08/apcs-von-denen-fast-niemand-spricht/ Hahn, D., Hehn, J., Hopp, C., & Pruschak, G. (2022). Mapping the Swiss landscape of diamond open access journals. The PLATO study on scholar-led publishing . https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7461728 Piwowar, H., Priem, J., Larivière, V., Alperin, J. P., Matthias, L., Norlander, B., Farley, A., West, J., & Haustein, S. (2018). The state of OA: a large-scale analysis of the prevalence and impact of Open Access articles. PeerJ , 6, e4375. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.4375 Schmeja, S. (2018, October 24). Gold, Grün, Bronze, Blau...: Die Open-Access-Farbenlehre. TIB-Blog . https://blogs.tib.eu/wp/tib/2018/10/24/gold-gruen-bronze-blau-die-open-access-farbenlehre/ Taubert, N., Sterzik, L., & Bruns, A. (2024). Mapping the German Diamond Open Access journal landscape. Minerva , 62 (2), 193–227. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-023-09519-7...

Intro Facts about Open Access Journals open-access.network (2026) ( CC BY 4.0 International ) The key takeaways from this article are 1 Open access journals are journals whose articles are available and reusable worldwide free of charge and without restrictions immediately on publication. 2 Most open access journals do not charge their authors for publishing articles. In other cases, the author-pays model is common. 3 The content published in open access journals is searchable in the usual databases and search engines – the Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (BASE) specialises in open access content. Definition Open access journals are journals whose articles are available and reusable worldwide free of charge and without restrictions immediately on publication. As a rule, contributions in journals that meet this definition are published under a Creative Commons licence granted by the authors. The publishers of these journals are granted only a non-exclusive right of use by the authors. Open access journals are the primary medium for what is known as gold open access to scholarly articles. If a journal does not levy article processing charges (APCs) , this is often referred to as diamond open access . Through gold or diamond open access, articles achieve the widest possible dissemination and are available to and reusable by researchers and all other interested parties as fast as possible. In this way, the visibility of research results is enhanced and their citation frequency is often increased ( Piwowar et al., 2018 ). open-access.network ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Open Access and Closed Access Practical Tip An overview of the requirements that open access journals must satisfy, and concrete criteria that authors can use as a guide when choosing a suitable publication venue can be found in the slides of a German-language presentation on the topic of " Quality of open access journals – Where to publish and where not to publish? ". Practical Tip The following tools can be helpful in finding suitable OA publication venues for your own manuscript: oa.finder (a tool for searching for scholarly publication venues; developed as a project by open-access.network ) B!SON (Open Access journal recommender, developed by TIB and SLUB Dresden ) Quality Assurance and Impact Measurement Find an introduction here. In terms of quality, there is no difference between open access and closed access (i.e., subscription-based ) journals. As is the norm in the case of scholarly journals, manuscripts undergo a quality assurance procedure – mostly peer review – before publication. In the context of open science and the idea of a transparent scientific process, some open access journals even go one step further and offer open peer review . By making the identities of all participants open, quality assurance becomes a community process, thereby ensuring constructive criticism. Moreover, the free availability of the full texts has the advantage of making it easier to detect plagiarism and errors. Where customary in the discipline in question, some open access journals occasionally also practise a form of editorial review. Video on the Funding of Open Access Articles Source: Becklas Dorow, C., Hauss, J. (2026). Funding Open Access Articles – What Are the Options?. Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB), open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/73596 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Funding The main difference between open and closed access journals lies in the free availability and reusability of the former and in the way they are funded . In the case of traditional closed access (subscription-based) journals, the readers, or their institutions and scholarly libraries, pay high fees for access to the articles. Open access publications, by contrast, can be used free of charge. Hence, funding must take place via a different channel. The so-called author-pays model, where authors pay article processing charges (APCs) to publish their contributions, is very widespread. However, the majority of open access journals do not charge APCs ( Morrison, 2018 ). Rather, they are funded by professional societies, scientific institutions or library consortia, or through volunteer work. By now, many closed access journals offer authors the option of paying a high fee to make individual contributions freely available. The publishers of these so-called hybrid journals thus generate additional revenues without there being a corresponding decrease in subscription prices. Because of this so-called double dipping on the part of publishers, hybrid open access is quite controversial. Via transformative agreements with commercial publishers – for example, those negotiated by the German initiative Projekt DEAL – the costs of these hybrid APCs are increasingly being covered in a contractually specified amount by library consortia with the aim of transforming the hybrid journals into open access journals in the long run. Many research funders and institutional publication funds refuse to fund OA publication fees for contributions to hybrid journals (see e.g. Plan S ). To circumvent these exclusion criteria, some major publishers have founded so-called "mirror journals" , i.e. OA versions of subscription journals whose thematic focus, editorial boards and peer review processes are largely identical to those of the corresponding subscription journal. Both the cOAlition S and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) consider such journals to be de facto hybrid journals whose articles are not eligible for funding ( Voigt, 2022 ). open-access.network ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Source: altmetric.com Self-Archiving Green open access can also be provided to publications in closed access journals by making them available free of charge in repositories . Under German copyright law (UrhG), scientific contributions published in conventional journals may, under certain conditions, be self-archived in a repository. Impact The Journal Impact Factors , a metric for the citation frequency of articles published in a given journal, are published in the Journal Citation Reports , which also covers open access journals. However, the misuse of the Journal Impact Factor to evaluate outputs of scholarly research has been strongly criticised (see the Declaration on Research Assessment, DORA ). Altmetrics have emerged as an alternative to the traditional bibliometric indicators. They capture the diverse reactions to scholarly publications on the Web. Finding Content The content published in open access journals is indexed in many locations and is searchable in the usual databases and search engines. The Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (BASE) specialises in open access content. In journal and article databases, filter options offer the possibility of limiting the search to open access content. This is the case, for example, in the Electronic Journals Library (the option "free for everyone") or in the Web of Science. GoTriple is an interesting discovery platform for open access content from the social sciences and humanities. A useful open source tool for finding open access versions of scholarly publications is Unpaywall , which is available as a browser extension for Firefox and Chrome ( Piwowar et al., 2018 ). Finding Open Access Publications Numerous search engines specialise in open access. This presentation provides an overview of how to find free scientific literature. Open Access in Specific Disciplines The introductions to open access in specific disciplines on open-access.net are also a good starting point. Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) The central database for open access journals is the DOAJ, which can also be searched by field. Publishing Open Access Journals Find an introduction here. German-Language Presentation on “Founding Open Access Journals” The slides of this presentation entitled “ Open-Access-Zeitschriften gründen – woran muss ich denken? [Founding open access journals – What should I bear in mind] provide valuable tips about the things that editors should consider before launching an open access journal. Founding A Journal Do you see a need for a new journal in your field, and would you like to publish it as an open access journal? Many open access journals are set up by scholars and scientists. Because there are now a large number of options from a discipline-specific, technical, and financial perspective, we would recommend, as a first step, that you talk to the open access experts at your institution. Many institutions offer their researchers the possibility of supporting the creation and management of independent open access journals, for example, via the software application Open Journal Systems (OJS) . One example is the TIB – Leibniz Information Centre for Science and Technology and University Library, which operates a publication platform, TIB Open Publishing , on which open access journals can be hosted with OJS. Although open to all fields, the focus is on the technical sciences and the natural sciences. In addition, there are also a number of open access publishers – and also conventional publishers, which are increasingly switching to open access publications – under whose umbrella you could set up your journal. We recommend that you take a look at our discipline-specific pages to see which publishers in your field already have open access offerings. The Open Access Journals Toolkit can also provide helpful guidance on founding and operating an open access journal. If you want to convert an existing subscription-based journal to open access rather than founding a new journal, you can find further information on how to do so on our Converting Journals to Open Access page. References Kaden, Ben (2023): OA Takeaways: Die Kritik am DEAL-Vertrag mit Elsevier in der FAZ vom 29.11.2023. https://doi.org/10.59350/dzrhw-yb070 Mittermaier, B. (2025). Transformationsverträge sind eine Sackgasse: In Erinnerung an Irene Barbers (1966–2025). O-bib , 12 (1), 1–22. https://doi.org/10.5282/o-bib/6117 Piwowar, H., Priem, J., Larivière, V., Alperin, J. P., Matthias, L., Norlander, B., Farley, A., West, J., & Haustein, S. (2018). The state of OA: A large-scale analysis of the prevalence and impact of Open Access articles. PeerJ, 6 , e4375. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.4375 Ross-Hellauer, T. (2017). What is open peer review? A systematic review [Version 2; peer review: 4 approved]. F1000Research, 6 , 588. https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.11369.2 Voigt, M. (2022, August 15). Spieglein, Spieglein an der Wand… Mirror Journals gezielt erkennen. FIS & EPub – Gemeinsamer Blog der DINI AG Forschungsinformationssystem und Elektronisches Publizieren . https://blog.dini.de/EPub_FIS/2022/08/15/spieglein-spieglein-an-der-wand-mirror-journals-gezielt-erkennen/ Ziegler, G. M., & Dirnagl, U. (2024, August 29). Pro & Contra: Warum die „Deal“-Verträge (k)ein Gewinn für die Wissenschaft sind. Forschung & Lehre. https://www.forschung-und-lehre.de/politik/warum-die-deal-vertraege-kein-gewinn-fuer-die-wissenschaft-sind-6595...

Find answers to legal questions here Legal Issues in Germany Legal Issues in Austria Legal Issues in Switzerland Licences Publishing Agreements Data Protection and Open Access Data protection is particularly of interest in the case of the open access publication of research data, or data sharing. In some fields, for example medicine or psychology, data protection in the context of open access is especially important because sensitive personal data may be processed. At European level, data protection is regulated by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) . As an EU decree law, it must be applied directly. The GDPR therefore takes precedence over national data protection law. In Switzerland, the Federal Act on Data Protection ( FADP, SR 235.1) applies. For higher education institutions in Switzerland, the data protection laws of the respective cantons are usually applicable. Further information on the topic of data protection and research data can be found on the website forschungsdaten.info ....

Intro Numerous legal issues must be considered when implementing open access strategies or operating open access repositories and open access journals . On these pages you will find information on the legal framework for open access in Austria. In practice, both authors and repository operators often face the question of what legal regulations must be observed when making documents available to the public in repositories. These regulations are based on copyright law, the law most frequently consulted when it comes to open access. By now, most publishers allow their authors to self-archive a version of their articles in an institutional repository or on their own personal websites. However, conditions and restrictions are often imposed. For example, authors are often obliged to observe an embargo period between the publication date and the date on which the work is made openly accessible online. The Open Policy Finder database (formerly SHERPA RoMEO) provides information on the self-archiving policies of individual publishers. Nowadays, many authors whose publishers do not yet permit self-archiving supplement their standard publishing agreements with contract addenda that enable them to make their works available in open access in parallel with publication. Such addenda can also be used to avoid embargo periods. To give authors and users of open access contributions legal certainty, these works should be distributed only under an open content licence . Repository operators must also pay particular attention to the liability risks involved in operating repositories. Furthermore, data protection aspects play a very important role, especially in the case of open access to data. Copyright Austrian Copyright Law In Austria, the Federal Law on Copyright in Works of Literature and Art and on Related Rights ( Austrian Copyright Act – UrhG ) applies. Copyright as a body of law (i.e. copyright in the objective sense) grants authors subjective rights in their intellectual property (i.e. copyright in the subjective sense). Copyright is inheritable, but it is not otherwise transferrable (Section 23 UrhG). However, authors may permit others to use their works in a particular manner or in any manner of exploitation to which they are entitled under Sections 14–18a UrhG (right of use in the work and authorisation of the use of the work). The Territoriality Principle and Lex Loci Protectionis The copyright law of a state applies only within its own territory. This means that it has effect only within the borders of the country in which it was enacted. Hence, for example, the provisions of Austrian copyright law apply only on Austrian territory and those of German copyright law are applicable only on German territory (territoriality principle). Because the protective reach of national copyrights is limited spatially to the territory of the state in question, there is no uniform, globally valid copyright. Rather, a whole bundle of territorially limited national copyrights is available to authors. Where there is a connection between a work and a specific foreign country (“foreign nexus”), the territoriality principle also has conflict-of-laws implications insofar as the law that is applicable is that of the country for whose territory protection is claimed. This is referred to as the lex loci protectionis principle. It follows from this principle that the accrual, substance, and expiry of (subjective) copyright are determined by the law of the country in which the respective use, exploitation, or infringement takes place. The question of the personal applicability of copyright – that is, who enjoys protection under the respective applicable provisions and for what – is a separate issue. It is also referred to as the domestic nexus. In Austria, Section 94 et seq. of the Austrian Copyright Act (UrhG) are relevant in this regard. Besides the primarily relevant citizenship principle (Section 94 UrhG), further possible points of reference include, in particular, the place of publication and the place of performance (Section 95 and Section 97 UrhG). Nationals of European Union (EU) and European Economic Area (EEA) countries can invoke the principle of non-discrimination (Article 18 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union [TFEU] and Article 4 of the European Economic Area Agreement). Copyright protection against nationals of third countries exists according to state treaties or subject to reciprocity (Section 96 UrhG). A key role is played by international copyright treaties (e.g. the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works and the Universal Copyright Convention), which lay down the principle of “national treatment”. For example, a US researcher who is working at a Swiss university and in the course of their work there publishes an article with a German publisher that is uploaded without their consent to the website of an Austrian database operator can invoke the protection of Austrian copyright law. Harmonisation of copyright law at the European level is leading to increasing standardisation of national provisions, which in turn is leading to international alignment of protection levels. Nonetheless, non-negligible and sometimes major differences exist between the national legal systems, which must be considered in each individual case. The Berne Convention – an international treaty to which most states in the world are a party – has led to the harmonisation of many elements of copyright law. As a result, the principle of lex loci protectionis (the law of the place where protection is claimed) also leads to fewer upheavals. For example, a scholarly publication in Germany enjoys the same protection as in the United States or South Africa. Things get more complicated in the case of limitations on copyright (also referred to in Germany as Schranken des Urheberrechts ) – that is, types of use permitted by law. For example, if a German researcher in Austria downloads a U.S. publication from a U.S. database in order to conduct a natural language processing (NLP) analysis in Austria within the framework of their research, this is covered by Section 42h of the Austrian Copyright Act (Text and Data Mining). Even if the publisher’s terms of use explicitly forbid such an action, it remains permissible under local law. In the event of legal proceedings, the dispute would be judged according to Austrian law because the owners of the U.S. database would seek legal protection in Austria, and therefore – according to the lex loci protectionis principle – Austrian law would be applicable. What Does Copyright Protect? Copyright protects works and related rights (also known as “neighbouring rights”). Works within the meaning of the Austrian Copyright Act (Section 1 UrhG) are original intellectual creations in the fields of literature, music, art, and cinematography. According to Austrian case law, the individual character alone is decisive for determining the existence of an original intellectual creation. A creation is individually characteristic if it sets itself apart from the everyday or the commonplace. The result of a creative intellectual activity that derives the individuality that distinguishes it from other works from the personality of its creator is deemed to be a work. A specific degree of originality (“threshold of originality”) is not required. As a result, even simple and apparently trivial creations can enjoy copyright protection irrespective of their aesthetic, scientific, or other value, provided they can be assigned to a category of works in the domains of literature, music, art, or cinematography. Copyright protects a work in whole or in part. Adaptations of a work (Section 5 UrhG) and collections (Section 6 UrhG) also enjoy copyright protection. Furthermore, copyright protects only works created by humans. Although this point has recently become particularly relevant in connection with outputs generated by artificial intelligence (AI), it is also of relevance when assessing the protection of machine-generated research data. Even if the latter are the result of complex processes, and setting up the experiment or the machine may involve considerably more effort than, for example, writing a short text, the results (i.e. the data) are not protected unless the individual expression of the author comes through in them. The situation is similar in the case of AI-generated works (including texts produced with large language models [LLMs]). To obtain copyright protection, the work must reflect conscious decisions on the part of the creator. The boundaries are fluid and sometimes difficult to determine. As a rule of thumb, wherever a process is merely initiated by humans (e.g. by entering a prompt or starting a machine), the results do not enjoy protection. What Are Related Rights? Related rights (also known as neighbouring rights) protect performances or products that are not themselves works but are performed or produced in connection with works or are similar to them. This includes performances by performing artists (Section 66 et seq. of the Austrian Copyright Act [UrHG]), the protection of event organisers (Section 72 UrhG), the production of photographs and moving images (Sections 73–75 UrhG), the production of audio recordings (Section 76 UrhG), the protection of broadcasts (Section 76a UrhG), the first publication of works in which copyright has expired (Section 76b UrhG), the production of investment-intensive databases (Sections 76c–76e UrhG), and – since the amendment of the Austrian Copyright Act in 2021 – the production of press releases (Section 76f UrhG). Compared with copyright protection in the narrower sense, the prerequisites for and the scope of protection are less extensive in the case of related rights. Furthermore, the term of protection of related rights is shorter. What Rights Does Copyright Grant Copyright grants authors moral rights on the one hand and economic exploitation rights on the other. The moral rights of authors, which are non-transferrable, protect authors’ moral interests in their works, whereas the exploitation rights regulate their powers to economically exploit a work. Exploitation rights are so-called exclusive rights, that is, they entitle the author to exploit the work to the exclusion of all other persons. The most important exploitation right is the right of reproduction, which entitles the author to forbid any unauthorised reproduction of the work (e.g. any digital copy). Other important rights include the right of making works available to the public (which is, e.g., important when uploading protected content online) and the right of broadcasting. Term of Protection of Works Copyright protection accrues the moment a work is created. Further measures, for example registration or an official administrative act, are not required. Copyright ends 70 years after the death of the author or – in the case of several joint authors – 70 years after the death of the last surviving joint author (Section 60 of the Austrian Copyright Act [UrhG]). In contrast to industrial property rights (especially trademark, design, and patent rights), the term of protection of copyrights and related rights cannot be extended. A work whose term of protection has expired can be used freely. However, as explained in the following paragraph, caution is warranted when doing so. Several rightholders with rights of different terms of protection may have participated in a work. In the case of a piece of music, for example, the copyright of the composer or the lyricist may have expired long ago, but the related rights of the performing musicians and producers may still persist. In the case of texts that have been translated or otherwise adapted, besides the term of protection of the rights of the authors, the rights in the adaptation may have to be considered separately. In the case of photos, a distinction must be made between the rights of photographers and, if applicable, the rights in the photographed object. Only when all copyrights and related rights have expired, may the content be freely used in its entirety. And finally, it should be borne in mind that the term of protection may differ in other countries. When calculating the term of protection, the year of occurrence of the event that determined the commencement of the term of protection (e.g. the death of the author) should not be counted. In other words, the term of protection always begins on 1 January of the calendar year that follows the decisive point in time. Freely Usable Content Works in the public domain are not protected by copyright and may thus be used freely (Section 7 of the Austrian Copyright Act [UrhG]). They include laws, regulations, official decrees, public announcements, and court decisions, as well as other official literary works and works of a scientific or didactic nature produced exclusively or primarily for official use that consist of two- or three-dimensional figurative representations (e.g. maps or relief representations of mountain ranges), provided they are not classified as works of art. However, materials published by higher education institutions, for example examination tasks, sample solutions, scripts, etc., are not deemed to be works in the public domain. Furthermore, ideas, thoughts, concepts, methods, rules of play, etc. are not eligible for copyright protection. Only the tangible, outwardly perceptible form enjoys protection, not the still intangible intellectual content as such. For example, ideas or concepts for a specific course or research project, a didactic concept, or criteria for the successful completion of a course are not eligible for protection. Scientific findings and teachings, such as formulae, scientific or didactic methods, laws of nature, individual chords, a style, a verse form, geometric symbols, saga material, and inspirations from nature or history, are also freely usable. They are classified as intellectual property in the public domain. This category also includes the CVs of persons, historical events, current events, and news content. Therefore, copyright in a scholarly work does not protect the historical, economic, or societal data, facts and theories presented therein. Rather, protection accrues to the respective presentation, structure, selection, etc. – that is, to the concrete elaboration or preparation of a specific material. Authorship / Accrual of Copyright Protection The author of a work is the person who created it (Section 10 [1] of the Austrian Copyright Act [UrhG]). Thus, the “creator principle” is enshrined in law. It follows from this that the author can only ever be a human being (a “natural person”) and never an animal, a machine, or a legal person (e.g. a regional or local authority, a university, or an enterprise). However, a legal person may acquire exclusive rights of use in the works ( Werknutzungsrechte ) or authorisations to use the works ( Werknutzungsbewilligungen ; licences) of third parties and thus become the holder of derived rights of use. But the natural person who created the work always remains the author. This applies also to a ghostwriter who is commissioned by another to write on their behalf and who is the only one who can claim authorship. This right cannot be waived (Section 19 [2] UrhG). However, a person may validly waive the right to be named as the author of a work (Section 20 [1] UrhG). After the author’s death, the heirs, as universal successors in title, assume the legal position of copyright holder. From the creator principle, it further follows that statutory copyright protection accrues automatically the moment the work is created (“real act of creation”). In contrast to brands, designs, or patents, the acquisition of protection requires neither registration nor a sovereign act. The advantage of the “automatic” accrual of copyright protection is that a work is effectively protected immediately without additional financial expense and formal effort. Several Participants in the Creation of a Work Joint authorship Where several persons have jointly created a work, and the work constitutes an indivisible unit, copyright accrues jointly to all joint authors (Section 11 [1] of the Austrian Copyright Act [UrhG]). Each joint author is separately entitled to take legal action against violations of copyright. Alteration or exploitation of the work requires the consent of all joint authors. If a joint author refuses consent without sufficient reason, any other joint author may sue for the grant of consent (Section 11 [2] UrhG). The combination of works of different types – for example a work of music and a literary or cinematographic work – does not establish joint authorship (Section 11 [3] UrhG); nor does an adaptation, where a work is used as a basis for a new work, or an individual contribution to a collection (e.g. a legal commentary). However, the authors of a jointly authored essay are joint authors. Joint authorship can also arise because of the transfer of copyright to several heirs due to the death of the copyright holder (Section 23 [4] UrhG). Partial Authorship The divisible combination of independent works of different types (e.g. a film and film music) does not establish joint authorship but rather partial authorship. The authors of individual contributions in a collection may – independently of the editors and the authors of other contributions – decide freely on the exploitation of the content of their own contributions, unless otherwise contractually agreed. The same applies, for example, to the setting to music of a song text. Unless an agreement to the contrary has been entered into, the authors of song texts are entitled to commission a new score without the consent of the composers, and the composers are entitled to use new lyrics. Assistants Furthermore, assistants and persons who contribute ideas must be distinguished from joint authors. Because only a person who makes a creative contribution to a work can be deemed to be an author of the work, mere ideas or tips from the mentors of a thesis, for example, do not suffice to establish joint authorship. This applies even if the mentors suggested the topic of the thesis. Therefore, ideas, abstract suggestions, or the supervision of a work do not result in joint authorship. Assistants do not make an independent creative contribution to the creation of a work, either, and therefore do not acquire copyright. Hence, the purely routine activities – such as literature searches, the production of subject indexes and bibliographies, the elaboration of footnotes, and copy editing – that are typically performed by research assistants or student assistants do not lead to the accrual of (joint) copyright. However, it should be noted that, according to the Austrian Universities Act (UG), university members who have made an independent scientific or artistic contribution to a work must be named as co-authors (Section 106 [1] UG). Plagiarism is deemed to have been committed when text, content, or ideas are used and presented as one’s own. This encompasses in particular the appropriation and use of text passages, theories, hypotheses, findings, or data by directly quoting, paraphrasing, or translating them without appropriate identification and citation of the source and the authors (Section 51 [2] Number 31 UG). Rights Ownership in the Case of Contractual and Employment Relationships In practice, the granting of rights of use often means that authorship and rights ownership are separated. Especially in cases where persons are paid to create copyrighted works – in other words in contractual and employment relationships – it is customary that the authors themselves are not entitled, or are entitled only to a limited extent, to make decisions about the exploitation of their works, because the exploitation rights pass to the contracting entity or the employer. Except in the case of computer programs and database works (Section 40b and Section 40f [3] UrhG), the Austrian Copyright Act does not contain any explicit special provisions for the creation of works in a contractual or employment relationship. Contracting entities and employers therefore primarily need – and are well advised – to have the rights contractually granted to them. However, even in the absence of an explicit agreement about rights ownership, a tacit grant of rights is assumed in the case of works created in the course of official duties, to the extent that that is necessary to fulfil the purpose of the (work) contract. According to previous case law, the following already applied before the amendment of the Austrian Copyright Act in 2021: If a work is created on behalf of a third party, that party is – at least logically – granted the right to use the work for the purpose for which it was commissioned. If the contract is meaningful for the contracting entity only if that entity alone is entitled to use the work product, then the contract between the contracting entity and the performing contractor includes the granting of a right of use in the work. In cases of doubt, the scope of the rights granted was determined by the practical purpose of the envisaged use of the work. With the amendment of the Austrian Copyright Act in 2021, the principle that the purpose of the contract determines the rights granted ( Zweckübertragungsgrundsatz ) was also enshrined in law (Section 24c UrhG). However, it does not apply to works created in the context of an employment relationship. Particular consideration should be given to the employment relationship when interpreting (implied) contracts. Clauses granting rights of use can also be found in the usual (employment) contracts at universities and research institutions. If such an agreement with researchers is lacking, and if they produce a work, for example a PowerPoint presentation or an E-learning unit, it should be established whether it arose in performance of official duties or whether another obligation to produce the work can be derived from the underlying contractual relationship. In these cases – for example in the case of project staff employed to generate E-learning content – a tacit grant of rights can be assumed even in the absence of an explicit legal agreement, so that the rights are held by the university. It should be noted that because of the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of research and science (Article 17 Austrian Basic Law [StGG]), university members and university teachers have the right to freely dispose of the results of their own work and to decide themselves about the publication or exploitation of their works. The authors of the teaching and learning material are therefore the respective teachers. Where they have commissioned third parties to produce the material, these third parties are considered to be the authors of that material. In the absence of contractual agreements to the contrary, the exploitation rights in teaching and learning material are always held by the teachers because their duties primarily comprise teaching and the transfer of knowledge but not, however, the provision of material. Caution is therefore warranted when assuming tacit grants of rights. In the absence of corresponding provisions in the (employment) contract, separate licensing agreements should be concluded. Where university members and university teachers generally act outside the obligations of their (employment) contracts, they may freely dispose of such works and decide independently about their exploitation. In this case, too, contractual agreements are necessary in order to be able to exploit such work results. Where a higher education institution intends to make their students’ dissertations and theses available in its own repository, it must secure the necessary rights of use from the authors (see also Section 86 of the Austrian Universities Act [UG]). If exclusive rights of use are granted in a specific work, the authors are excluded from using and further exploiting the work themselves. In this case, the licensing of the content by the author under an open source/open access licence such as a Creative Commons licence is ineffective. Links for Further Reading Amini, S. & Forgó, N. (2019). Urheberrechtsfragen beim Einsatz von Multimedia an Hochschulen. Ein Leitfaden für die Praxis am Beispiel der Universität Wien. Available online: https://phaidra.univie.ac.at/o:28164 Making Documents Publicly Available in Repositories The most important source of information about the permissibility of self-archiving one’s own contribution in a repository after concluding an agreement with a publisher is the publishing agreement itself. Most publishing agreements are standard contracts that provide for the granting of relatively comprehensive rights to the publisher. It is therefore advisable to study the agreement closely and if necessary to talk to the publisher about individual clauses. In the absence of an explicit provision, rights are deemed to have been granted only to the extent that they are necessary for the purpose of the agreement. There are two provisions in the Austrian Copyright Act (UrhG) that may still be relevant after the agreement has been concluded. Section 36 of the UrhG aims to give authors the opportunity, under certain circumstances, to republish works that have appeared in a collection. The prerequisite for its application is therefore that the work (e.g. an essay or also non-written works such as videos or images) is part of a collection. The term “collection” should be understood in a broad sense; it includes anything that comprises several parts that are connected at least outwardly but not necessarily in terms of content. However, the collection must be published periodically, that is, at regular intervals. Typical examples include yearbooks, journals, and newspapers, but not works such as Festschriften, memorial volumes, or monographs If these prerequisites are met, the Austrian Copyright Act (UrhG) provides for specific time limits for the expiry of exclusive rights, after which the contributions may be further exploited. In the case of newspapers, the rights expire after publication of the contribution, otherwise after one year. Note, however, that the application of this provision may be precluded by the publishing agreement and is also precluded in practice. Hence, it is important to always check the publishing agreement carefully. The second provision is the so-called secondary publication right , which is regulated in Section 37a of the Austrian UrhG. Even if the author has already granted exclusive rights of use to a publisher, they can still seek to have the contribution republished after an embargo period of 12 months under the following conditions: The author must be a member of the academic staff of a research institution at least half of which is financed by public funds, and they must have created the contribution in this capacity. The contribution must have appeared in a collection that is published periodically at least twice a year. The version used for secondary publication may only be the author’s accepted manuscript version (i.e. not the publisher’s typeset and formatted version, also known as the version of record). The secondary publication may only be for non-commercial purposes. The source of the first publication must be cited. This right cannot be contractually precluded . The secondary publication right also facilitates the exploitation of works in the context of academic teaching. Although only the authors themselves may exercise this right in their own works, they are entitled to republish the work under an open content licence , for example, for the purpose of making it available to the public, and thus also to permit it to be used in digital or analogue mode in seminars in a legally watertight way. In addition, it should be noted that making a work available in open access in a repository constitutes making the work available to the public within the meaning of the Austrian Copyright Act, and licences for protected content of third parties in the publication (e.g. figures) may be necessary, as free uses of the work provided for in the Act, such as those in the area of research and teaching, then no longer apply. Further Links On secondary publication right A brief overview of further innovations resulting from the copyright amendment Uhr-Nov 2015 A guide to copyright and digital media (available only in German) Liability Liability for Copyright Infringements on the Internet In principle, the same liability rules apply on the internet as in the analogue world. Anyone who undertakes activities exclusively reserved for the author without the authorisation of the author or the corresponding rightholders breaks the law. Hence, anyone who includes, for example, copyright-protected images or texts of third parties in their publication and makes that publication freely accessible in a repository without the authorisation of the respective authors is liable to prosecution, as this constitutes making the work available to the public. Consequences in the event of infringement are usually a cease and desist and removal claim (i.e. an obligation to cease the action, refrain from it in the future, and remove all traces of it; Sections 81 and 82, respectively, of the Austrian Copyright Act [UrhG]) and the payment of an appropriate licence fee (Section 86 UrhG). According to Section 89a UrhG, large online platforms are also responsible for copyright infringements on the part of their users if they have not taken appropriate countermeasures. This provision, which derives from an EU regulation (and which has also become known under the heading “upload filter”), primarily targets large online platforms like YouTube, but it can also have an impact in other contexts. What is important, however, is that it does not apply to scholarly repositories and encyclopaedias. Liability Risks Involved in Operating Institutional Repositories The tasks of institutional repositories usually comprise storing and managing documents produced by researchers from the respective higher education institution or research organisation and making them available to the public. When a document is deposited in an institutional repository, it is not available online immediately but rather undergoes checks that vary in scope depending on the repository. These may range from checking details, through keyword tagging and cataloguing, to content checking (on quality assurance in general in electronic archives, see Andermann & Degwitz, 2004 , p. 53 et seq.). In the context of the storage of files in repositories, infringements of intellectual property rights (such as copyrights, trademark rights, and patent rights) and trade secrets law are conceivable. As mentioned above, Section 89a of the Austrian Copyright Act (UrhG) on the liability of large online platforms or copyright infringements on the part of their users does not apply to scholarly repositories. However, authors can also address their claims for damages against a repository within the framework of so-called intermediary liability (see Section 81 [1a] UrhG). Article 6 of the EU-wide Digital Services Act (DSA) provides for the so-called host-provider privilege. It states that a hosting service provider, for example an online repository, is not liable for the information stored in the infrastructure at a user’s request, provided it does not have actual knowledge of the circumstances giving rise to liability or, upon obtaining such knowledge, it acts immediately. This means in particular that repositories are not obliged to individually check their users’ content. Rather, they are obliged only to act immediately as soon as they obtain knowledge of the circumstances from which the illegal activity is apparent. Conversely, this means that wherever curatorial services are provided – that is, where data are prepared by repository staff in collaboration with researchers – this liability privilege does not apply, because content preparation occurs. In such constellations, it is important that appropriate contractual provisions be put in place. The above-mentioned intermediary liability (Section 81 [1a] UrhG) applies only to a limited extent where the host-provider privilege under Article 6 of the Digital Services Act applies – in the first step, the only possibility is to notify the repository of the infringement. Upon receipt of the notification, the repository must immediately investigate the allegations and, if necessary, remove the content. In addition, liability may also arise from a data protection perspective if personal data are stored in the repository and data protection regulations are not complied with. In this context, it is relevant whether the repository is acting as a controller (Article 4 [7] of the EU General Data Protection Regulation [GDPR]) or as a processor (Artikel 4 [8] GDPR). The controller is the natural or legal person that determines the purposes and means of the data processing, while the processor is merely the natural or legal person that carries out the actual processing on behalf of and bound by the instructions of the controller. Here too, a distinction is made depending on the extent to which the repository influences the preparation of the data or whether it merely makes unsupervised storage space available. Personal Homepage/Website Self-archiving in the sense of self-posting refers to the individual, non-standardised archiving of publications and making them available to the public on an author’s personal homepage on a faculty or institute website, or on their own personal website. Here too, infringements of intellectual property rights may occur (see the previous two tabs), and the principles remain the same. Furthermore, it should be noted that anyone who operates a website – that is, anyone who is responsible for its content design – is a media owner within the meaning of the Austrian Media Act (MedienG). This becomes particularly relevant when an author provides an opportunity for interactive discussion on their own personal website and invites users to submit comments, because, as the owner of the website, the author can then be made liable for infringements of rights that occur in the discussion forum Contractual Limitation of Liability A contractual indemnification and hold harmless agreement should be concluded with the persons who deposit content. In addition, to ensure that the host-provider privilege can be maintained in the event of legal proceedings, the repository should reserve the right to remove the content from the repository at its own discretion and after review if a rights infringement is suspected. Otherwise, a conflict could arise where researchers have a contractual right to store content in the repository, but the repository is required by a third party to cease and desist but cannot remove the content without being in breach of contract. In addition, researchers should be made aware that compliance with legal requirements is their responsibility and that the repository merely makes the infrastructure available. Furthermore, repositories should make use of the possibility to allow limited access to sensitive content, as this may also enable them to claim types of use permitted by law, for example digital use in teaching and learning. References Andermann, H., & Degwitz A. (2004). Neue Ansätze in der wissenschaftlichen Informationsversorgung. Bibliothek: Forschung und Praxis, 28(1), 35–59. https://doi.org/10.1515/BFUP.2004.35 Open Access Basics - How to publish and What to Consider? Find an introduction here. Open Access Helpdesk Please feel free to contact us with any open access-related questions. Ursprüngliche Bearbeitung der Kapitel Repositorien und Haftungsrecht: Dipl.-Jur. Seyavash Amini. Bearbeitung des Kapitels Urheberrecht: Dr. Alexander Baratsits und Dr. Katharina Majchrzak. Aktualisierung und Ergänzung der Inhalte dieser Seite: Christoph Korab (Stand: August 2025). Bitte beachten Sie, dass die hier dargestellten Inhalte nur der Information dienen und keine rechtsverbindlichen Auskünfte sind....

Introduction In connection with open access strategies , numerous legal questions arise for authors and for operators of publication platforms. They include, for example, questions regarding secondary publication rights when operating open access repositories . In addition, operators of publication platforms such as repositories and university presses must consider liability issues. On these pages, you will find introductory information on the statutory frameworks in Germany that are of relevance to the topic of open access. Please note that the content presented here is intended for information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. When publishing works for the first time, or when making published works available to the public, authors and operators of publication platforms must comply with the relevant statutory frameworks , in particular the German Civil Code (BGB) and the German Act on Copyright and Related Rights (UrhG). As a consequence of diverse copyright reforms at European Union level and in Germany, copyright law has been fundamentally updated, also with regard to the digital possibilities in science and publishing. In doing so, possibilities for authors to make a version of their published works available to the public online (referred to in Germany as "the secondary publication right" [ Zweitveröffentlichungsrecht ]) have also been created. Irrespective of this, many publishers now allow authors to self-archive a version of their works in an institutional repository, albeit often subject to conditions such as an embargo period between the date of first publication of the work by the publisher and the date on which the work is made available to the public on the Internet. The open access policies of many publishers can be found in the Open Policy Finder database. However, whether and in what form self-archiving is permitted ultimately depends on the terms of the licensing agreement concluded with the publisher. If the licensing agreement forbids self-archiving, the publisher’s entry in the Open Policy Finder database will only be an indication of whether renegotiating the agreement is likely to be successful. Therefore, whether and in what way secondary publication is possible must always be assessed case by case. To give the authors and users of open access content legal certainty, the first publication of this content should, if possible, be made available under an open content licence . For operators of repositories, the liability risks associated with the operation of repositories are of particular importance. Especially when publishing data , data protection aspects or privacy and publicity rights may play a role. Copyright Sources of copyright Copyright law regulates at a moral, non-economic level the relationships between creators and the works they have created. It also regulates the way in which these works may be exploited, and the extent to which creators may claim protection for their works. Article 27 (2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 10 December 1948 states that everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary, or artistic production of which they are the author. In the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany (Grundgesetz), this principle is enshrined in the right to free development of personality (Article 2), the right to freedom of expression in the arts and sciences (Article 5 [3]), and the guarantee of property (Article 14). For the territory of the Federal Republic of Germany, these rights are given concrete statutory form through the Act on Copyright and Related Rights ( UrhG ) and the Act on the Management of Copyright and Related Rights by Collecting Societies . Because copyright law is national law, the way it is framed in other states differs from the framing chosen in Germany. Cases with a cross-border dimension where the states in question are outside the EU are regulated by international treaties to which the Federal Republic has acceded. These treaties include in particular the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works as amended in 1979, the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights ( TRIPS ), and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty ( WCT ). In addition, there are a number of international treaties that cover neighbouring rights – that is, rights neighbouring, or related to, copyright. Within the EU, many aspects of copyright have been standardised by directives that member states were obliged to transpose into national law. Object of copyright law Authors are the main focus of copyright law. It regulates their relationships to their literary, scientific, or artistic works. The concept of “a work” is thus central to copyright law. Pursuant to Section 2 (2) of the German Copyright Act (UrhG), a “work” within the meaning of the Act is protected by copyright only if it reaches the requisite level of creativity ( Schöpfungshöhe ) – that is, it must be the result of a process of human creation that constitutes a personal creation in perceivable form and that has intellectual content and a personalised character. Further, the individuality of the author must be recognisable in “the author’s own intellectual creation”. The ideas, facts, and information contained in the work are not themselves protected. Pursuant to Section 2 (1) UrhG, personal creations in perceivable form include, for example, texts, speeches, computer programs, music, paintings, sculptures, buildings, photographic works, cinematographic works, and technical drawings and plans. Ownership of the work itself must be distinguished from copyright protection of the work: Whereas ownership of the work can be transferred in a commercial transaction, copyright always remains with the author, even if others have been granted rights of use. Thus, the owner of the work and the owner of the copyright are not necessarily one and the same person. Besides protection of the work under Section 2 (2) UrhG, intellectual creations may also be protected within the framework of “related rights” under Section 70 and seq. UrhG. Here, protection is based not on the quality of the work but rather (depending on the type of related right) on other aspects that constitute the value of the work from the perspective of the legislature. In the case of database rights (Section 87b UrhG), for example, one prerequisite for protection is that a substantial investment and effort was required to create the database. In the case of scientific editions (Section 70 UrhG), one prerequisite for protection is that “they represent the result of scientifically organised activity”. If a work or other subject matter does not satisfy these conditions, it is not protected by related rights. Protection by copyright accrues immediately upon creation of a subject matter that satisfies the above-mentioned conditions for protection. In other words, registration is not required. If several persons make an independent creative contribution to a work, they are deemed under Section 8 (1) UrhG to be joint authors if it is not possible to separately exploit their individual contributions to the work. This means that all those involved in the creation of the work are protected by the provisions of the Copyright Act. However, it also means they may only jointly avail of the rights resulting therefrom. Unless otherwise agreed, they may obtain their share of the proceeds derived from any exploitation of the work only “in accordance with the extent of their involvement in the creation of the work” (Sections 8 [2] and [3] UrhG). Legal relationship between authors and their works The rights of authors under copyright law can be divided into two groups: on the one hand, the moral rights of authors, which are inalienable in principle; on the other hand, the rights to commercially exploit the work. Moral rights Figuratively speaking, the moral rights of authors are the inseverable umbilical cord between authors and their works, by means of which authors remain permanently attached to their works. First and foremost, these moral rights grant authors the right to decide whether their works should be published at all (right of first publication; Section 12 UrhG). When the works are published, authors may determine whether they should bear a designation of authorship, and which designation (name/pseudonym) should be used (Section 13 UrhG). And finally, authors may always defend themselves against distortions of their works (Section 14 UrhG). Although these rights are formulated in the German Copyright Act as inalienable rights, this is not always the case in practice. Exploitation rights Exploitation rights above all ensure that authors have the right to permit third parties to use their intellectual property, where appropriate against payment of a fee. This permission may be limited in respect of persons, content, place, or time, or it may be so comprehensive that, in economic terms, the third party to whom the permission has been granted assumes the position of the author. Rights of use may be granted as non-exclusive or exclusive rights. If authors grant several parties equally the right to use the work in a certain way, a non-exclusive right of use is granted. Licensees must tolerate that the work is used at the same time in the same way by others besides themselves, and that the authors retain the right to allow further third parties to use their intellectual property. Example: If an author grants the operator of a repository a non-exclusive right to publish their article in the repository – which includes granting all the necessary rights of use, for example the right of reproduction, the right of distribution, and the right of making the work available to the public (online provision) – they may still publish the article in a scholarly journal and grant the publisher the necessary rights of use. However, if the author has already granted a publisher exclusive rights to publish the work in a journal, they can no longer grant others any rights of use for this type of use. Exclusive rights of use entitle licensees to exclude third parties from using the rights granted exclusively to them in relation to the work in question, and to do so in a manner in which otherwise only the authors themselves could. If authors grant exclusive rights for a certain type of use, they may no longer grant other third parties rights for the same type of use. Example: If an author grants a publisher exclusive rights of use to publish their article in a journal – which includes exclusively granting all the necessary rights of use, for example the right of reproduction, the right of distribution, and the right of making the work available to the public online – they may initially no longer self-archive the work in a repository, unless they reserved that right in the publishing agreement (for information on the secondary publication right under Section 38 [4] UrhG, see below). Legal relationship between author and user Limitations on copyright Based on the above, only the authors are entitled in principle to permit others to use – or to exclude others from using – their intellectual property. However, in view of the social responsibility of ownership, the German legislature has limited this exclusivity in such a way that it permits by law the use of the intellectual property of another exceptionally in certain cases if this is in the overriding interest of the general public. In the limitations on copyright (Section 44a and seq. UrhG), users are granted rights to use copyrighted works, and, as a rule, authors cannot forbid them to do so. In the context of research and teaching, the following limitations on copyright are particularly relevant: Up to 75 per cent of a work may be reproduced for personal scientific research (Section 60c [2] UrhG). Up to 15 per cent of a work may be reproduced, distributed, and made available to the public for the purpose of non-commercial research for the following circles of persons (Section 60c [1] UrhG): “for a specifically delimited circle of persons for their personal scientific research” (access limited to this specific circle of persons) and “for individual third persons insofar as this serves the monitoring of the quality of scientific research”. Illustrations, individual articles from the same professional or scientific journal , other small-scale works, and out-of-commerce works may be reproduced, distributed, and made available to the public in full (Section 60c [3] UrhG). “For the purpose of illustration in teaching at educational establishments, up to 15 per cent of a published work may be reproduced, distributed, made available to the public, and otherwise communicated to the public on a non-commercial basis: for teachers and participants at the respective event, for teachers and examiners at the same educational establishment, and for third persons insofar as this serves the presentation of lessons or lectures or the results of tuition or training or learning outcomes at the educational establishment” (Section 60a [1] UrhG). For the purpose of text und data mining (Brehm, 2022), works may be reproduced: for non-commercial research purposes in accordance with the provisions of Section 60d UrhG; for commercial research purposes and all other purposes in accordance with the provisions of Section 44b UrhG. In addition, there are a range of other limitations on the author’s power of disposal in favour of libraries, archives, museums, and other third parties involved in the process of training and further educating the public. As a rule, authors receive remuneration for the use of a work within the framework of the limitations on copyright. Collecting societies such as GEMA and VG WORT charge manufacturers and importers a “levy on hardware and blank media”, which is then distributed to the authors. For other uses, the fees are paid directly to GEMA and VG Wort based on agreements. However, this sometimes presupposes membership of the authors in, or at least registration of the work with, the collecting society – as is the case with VG WORT. Handbook on the Right of Citation Citing from the copyrighted works of others is permitted under certain conditions. Information on this can be found in Handreichung Zitatrecht , a handbook on the right of citation published by the Communication, Information, Media Centre (KIM) at the University of Konstanz (KIM, 2020). Licensing Agreements Apart from the aforementioned limitations on copyright, authors may freely manage their legal relationships with third parties in respect of works that they have created. This means that they are in a position to negotiate with a contractual partner of their choice a largely customisable agreement on the authorisation of the use of their intellectual property on terms to be determined by themselves (“licensing agreement”). In practice, it sometimes happens that economically stronger users impose their conditions on authors. However, authors may also grant a free licence that allows users to reuse their works free of charge in a manner that suits the authors. Standardised licensing models such as open source licences (e.g., the GNU General Public License ) or open content licences (e.g., Creative Commons licences) are often used for this purpose. Special Case: Authors in Employment or Service Relationships Works eligible for copyright protection that are created within the framework of an employment or service relationship constitute a special case. Copyright remains with the authors, as it is an inalienable right. However, in the case of works that are created by employees in the execution of their duties or following the instructions of the employer, the employer or principal acquires the right of use in the works at the latest upon delivery of the works – which the authors may be obliged to do under the terms of the employment contract. Derogations from this general rule may be agreed upon in the employment contract. University teachers and scientific personnel who are not bound by instructions in the conduct of their research are as a matter of principle exempt from the aforementioned general rule. Nor are they obliged to offer to the institution that employs them works created in the context of research activities that are not bound by instructions. However, if the research activities are conducted on the basis of concrete instructions, university teachers and scientific personnel are also subject to the provision described above. The Secondary Publication Right for Authors of Scientific Contributions A further special arrangement, which privileges the authors of scientific contributions, entered into force in Germany on 1 January 2014. If authors have written a scientific contribution in the context of research activities, at least half of which are/were financed by public funds that do not stem from the basic budget of a public research institution or higher education institution, and if the contribution was published in a collection that is published periodically at least twice per year – especially in a scholarly journal, they may, pursuant to Section 38 (4) UrhG, make the contribution available to the public online in the accepted manuscript version for non-commercial purposes upon expiry of 12 months after first publication, provided they cite the source of the first publication. The contribution may be made available only online. Thus, secondary publication in print form is not covered. The provision in Section 38 (4) UrhG may not be derogated from by contract, even if the authors have granted a third party – for example a scholarly publisher – exclusive rights of use. This somewhat unwieldy provision is the result of a compromise that has been subject to criticism, especially by publishers. Although authors are not obliged to make use of the secondary publication right, the provision has opened a further channel of communication, and it is now possible to distribute scientific knowledge via a channel other than that monopolised by the classical scholarly journals. The provision has been criticised insofar as it covers only contributions that result from third-party-funded projects or from research activities conducted at publicly funded non-university research institutions. It has been argued that this disadvantages research activities funded from the basic budget, and thus violates the principle of equality enshrined in Article 3 (1) of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany (Grundgesetz). It has been further argued that the wording should therefore be understood more broadly to cover all scientific contributions that result from research activities at least half of which were financed by public funds. However, no judicial decisions have been rendered to date in this matter. Although many individual questions regarding this statutory provision are still open, it can be deemed certain that “the accepted manuscript version” means the version that has undergone peer review and been accepted for publication. In other words, it is substantively identical to the first publication, and differs from it only by the absence of the publisher’s layout and logo. The secondary publication right under Section 38 (4) UrhG does not allow the scientific contribution to be made available under an open content licence. Nor may it be made available for commercial purposes, for example by charging a fee. Useful resources in this connection are the FAQ zum Zweitveröffentlichungsrecht [FAQ on the Secondary Publication Right published by the Alliance of Science Organisations in Germany’s priority initiative Digital Information, and the online talk “ Zweitveröffentlichungsrecht für Wissenschaftler*innen ” [The Secondary Publication Right for Researchers] in the open-access.network series “Open Access Talk” (Brehm, 2021). Wo und wie offen publizieren? “Wo und wie offen publizieren?” [Where and how to publish in open access?], the first online seminar in the open-access.network series “Open Access Talk” (Rücknagel & Schmeja, 2020), provides an introduction to open access. Copyright in Academic Work BMBF-Guideline about the most important regulations on copyright for education and research in Germany. Open Policy Finder Even if an author has granted the publisher exclusive rights of use in a work, it is possible that, on request, the publisher will allow the work to be self-archived in parallel with publication on the author’s personal website or in a repository. Whether an author may self-archive a work in parallel with publication depends on the terms of the licensing agreement concluded with the publisher. If self-archiving in parallel with publication is not mentioned in the agreement, it is not permitted, and the author is bound thereby. However, you can check the Open Policy Finder database to see whether the publisher in question permits self-archiving in parallel with publication. The information in the Open Policy Finder database is not legally binding for the publisher and does not permit an author to self-archive a work in parallel with publication if this is not provided for in the publishing agreement. However, the information in the Open Policy Finder database does give an indication of whether renegotiating the rights is likely to be successful. The Open Policy Finder database is updated by the scientific community on a continuous basis. oa.helpdesk Here you can ask concrete questions about open access. Making Documents Available on Publication Platforms Time and again, authors and operators of publication platforms face the question whether a specific document may be made available to the public on their own website or on a publication platform (e.g., a repository) without running the risk of violating the rights of third parties. The answer to this question depends largely on the rights that the author (still) holds in the work in question. If the document has already been published elsewhere, third parties (e.g., a publisher) may have been granted rights in the document – for example under a licensing agreement. If the publisher has been granted exclusive rights of use in the work, and the self-archiving of the work in a repository is not explicitly permitted under the licensing agreement, these rights of use may not be granted a second time. Further, it is decisive whether the author has a secondary publication right pursuant to Section 38 (4) of the German Copyright Act (UrhG). And finally, the right to secondary publication (e.g., in a repository or a personal archive) might also be restored in the context of renegotiations with the publisher. It must therefore be examined on a case-by-case basis whether there are any legal barriers to self-archiving. The following scenarios provide an overview of the legal considerations that must be taken into account: The Initial Situation All rights are held by the author If the author of a copyrighted work has not yet concluded an agreement on the use of the work with a third-party (e.g., a publisher), copyright is still held by the author, and it is legally possible to publish the work in a medium of the author’s choice. If the work is published via a repository or with a publisher – for example in an open access journal – the author must conclude a licensing agreement with the repository operator or the publisher permitting them to do so. To publish the work via a repository, it suffices for the author to grant a non-exclusive right of use to “make the work available to the public (online provision) via the repository”. The author may – without hesitation – also make the work available under an open content licence that provides for a non-exclusive right of use to make the work available to the public. In many cases nowadays, works are published solely via repositories. This is especially the case when the examination, publication, or doctoral regulations of higher education institutions or the requirements of research funders either expressly permit or even mandate self-archiving in a repository. Agreements regarding dual publishing are also possible. Here, the author has the possibility to publish the work with a publisher or on a print-on-demand basis as well as making it available to the public via the repository. The constellations are numerous and should be discussed with the repository operator. The exception Non-exclusive rights of use have already been granted If the author has already granted a third party non-exclusive rights of use in the work (e.g., when self-archiving a preprint in arXiv), this does not prevent the author from additionally self-archiving it on their own personal website or in a repository. For even after granting non-exclusive rights of use to a third party, an author is still in a position to also grant other third parties non-exclusive rights, and thus may also grant the operator of a repository such a right. Even after granting non-exclusive rights of use, exclusive rights of use may still be granted. However, before concluding a contract, the author should make sure to inform the contractual partner that they have already granted non-exclusive rights of use to others. This applies in particular when the work has already been published under an open access licence. The rule A publisher has been granted exclusive rights of use If the author has already granted a third party – for example a publisher – exclusive rights of use in the work, the following constellations must be distinguished: Works published before 1995 In the case of works published before 1995, authors could not yet grant a publisher rights of use that allowed the work to be published on the Internet, as this was still an “unknown type of use” in respect of which contracts could not yet be concluded. However, the German legislature has provided for transitional provisions aimed at enabling the use of these works. According to these provisions, the rights for new types of use developed by 1995 (especially the making available of works via the Internet) are deemed to also to have been granted if: the licensing agreement concluded before 1995 granted all essential rights of use exclusively without limitation of place and time for all types of use known at the time the contract was concluded; after 1 January 2008 no agreement to the contrary was concluded with the author; and the author did not object (Section 137l UrhG). If these conditions are met, the contracting party with whom the author concluded the contract (in case of doubt, the publisher) may also make the work available to the public (online provision). Works published in or after 1995 In the case of works published in or after 1995, it depends on whether the grant of exclusive rights of use to the third party – for example the publisher – included the right to make the work available via the Internet. If this is not expressly stated in the agreement concluded between the author and the third party, pursuant to Section 31 (5) UrhG, only those rights of use are deemed to have been granted that would have had to be granted to achieve the purpose of the agreement ( Übertragungszwecklehre [purpose-of-transfer doctrine]). This includes in any case the right to reproduce and distribute the work in print form, but not the right to make the work available online if this was not explicitly planned. Pursuant to Section 38 (1) sentence 1 UrhG, where the author permits a publisher to include a contribution in a collection that is published periodically (e.g., a journal), then in case of doubt the publisher acquires an exclusive right of reproduction, distribution, and (from 1 January 2014 onwards) making the work available to the public online, unless an explicit arrangement was made between the author and the publisher. Such an arrangement does not have to fulfil specific requirements as to form (e.g., a printed contract). Rather, it may also be contained in a sentence or a brief comment in an email. However, as these exclusive rights are limited to a period of one year following the publication of the contribution (Section 38 [1] sentence 2 UrhG), the author may once again grant non-exclusive or exclusive rights to others after the year has elapsed. If the contribution appeared in a collection that is not published periodically – for example conference proceedings or a festschrift – the rights revert to the author only if permission for the inclusion of the contribution in the collection was not granted for a fee (Section 38 [2] UrhG). However, a number of publishers interpret this provision very generously and allow self-archiving in parallel with publication even if a fee was paid. Therefore, authors should always ask the publisher whether self-archiving in parallel with publication is permitted. Works that were or are published after 1 January 2014 With effect from 1 January 2014, the German legislature created an inalienable secondary publication right for authors of scientific contributions that result from research activities at least half of which were financed by public funds and that were published in a collection that is published periodically at least twice a year (Section 38 [4] UrhG). Regarding the nature of the public funds in question, there is a limitation to the effect that they must be third-party public funds. For contributions that result from research activities that were financed from basic funding or from purely didactic activities – for example of universities that are run as foundations or corporations under public law – the secondary publication right does not apply. However, this condition has been criticised as it leads to unequal treatment between scientists whose research is financed from third-party funds and scientists whose research is funded from an institution’s basic budget, and because it does not follow from the wording of Section 38 (4) UrhG. However, if the conditions for the accrual of the secondary publication right are met, authors may make – or allow others to make – their scientific contributions available to the public in the accepted manuscript version (the version that has undergone peer review and been accepted for publication but before application of the publisher’s layout) for non-commercial purposes upon expiry of one year after the date of first publication. Authors are not obliged to make use of their secondary publication right. However, if they decide to do so, the source of the first publication must be cited. The self-archiving of the contributions in a repository is therefore legally possible in these cases. However, they may not be released under an open access licence. The case of doubt It is often unclear whether making a document available to the public by self-archiving it infringes the rights of third parties. This applies especially in the case of a foreign publisher, and where the publishing agreement is possibly subject to foreign law. In such cases, authors are well advised to make an agreement regarding self-archiving in parallel with publication with the publisher to whom they have granted the right to publish and distribute the document. Liability Law Liability for Copyright Infringement on the Internet The question arises as to who must make good the damage that arises in the case of a violation of intellectual copyright by posting information to a publicly accessible website – that is, who is liable for a rights infringement. In particular the operators of repositories or other publication platforms (e.g., publishers) and the authors who make their documents available to the public on their own personal websites may be exposed to liability risks if they do not correctly assess their behaviour in advance. However, it is possible to minimise the risks, especially by drafting contracts appropriately. Legal Basis of Liability for Making Information Available to the Public on Websites The violation of intellectual property rights may consist in an infringement of the copyrights of authors or of the rights of use granted by authors to third parties (e.g., a publisher). When information is made available to the public on websites, injured parties can often identify only the operators of the website. Anyone who operates a website is a service provider within the meaning of Section 2 (1) of the German Telemedia Act (TMG) ; they may also be a service provider within the meaning of Section 2 of the German Act on the Copyright Liability of Online Content Sharing Service Providers (UrhDaG) . Liability under the German Telemedia Act Website operators are not automatically liable under the German Telemedia Act (TMG) for a rights infringement. A distinction must be made between whether the document that was made available to the public, thereby violating the rights of a third party, is the website operator’s own content or whether it is adopted content or third-party content. Under Section 7 TMG, website operators are always liable for their own content. Content is deemed to be “own content” if the website operator created the information themselves (e.g., their own essay or other text or their own graphic image). “Created themselves” does not mean that the website operator uploaded the information to the website themselves. Rather, the content may have been created and uploaded by an employee or by a third party commissioned by the website operator. Nor must the content have been created for the first time. It suffices that existing own content or existing content created by another person is integrated into the website operator’s website. However, this also means that information created by third parties may become own information if it is adopted by the website operator. In that case, the website operator is responsible under Section 7 TMG for that content. Information is deemed to be “third-party content” if it was entered and integrated into the website by a third party without the knowledge of the website operator, and if the website operator has no control over it – for example information (e.g., social media posts) made available on the platform by users. Under Section 10 TMG, website operators are not responsible for third-party content. However, website operators are also liable for content that they adopt and that they integrate into their website in such a way that – to observers of the website – it appears to be content that the operator of the website created themselves. This is the case in particular if the website operator – themselves or their employees or commissioned third parties – editorially checked or processed the information of third parties before its integration into the website, or if they integrated the information of third parties without labelling it accordingly. Injured parties may above all demand that the infringer eliminate the infringement, cease and desist, and make good the damage caused by the culpable infringement of copyright or exclusive rights of use (Section 97 UrhG). Liability under the Act on the Copyright Liability of Online Content Sharing Service Providers (UrhDaG) Liability under the UrhDaG presupposes that via the service the public is given access to copyright-protected works uploaded by its users (Section 1 UrhDaG). The only service providers that fall within the scope of the Act are providers of services that among other things make available to the public a large amount of copyright-protected content uploaded by third parties, and that act for the purpose of making a profit, for example by generating revenue by advertising content (Section 2 UrhDaG). Where the UrhDaG is applicable, service providers cannot rely on the liability privilege contained in Section 10 sentence 1 of the Telemedia Act (TMG). The UrhDaG establishes first and foremost that service providers must conclude licensing agreements with the authors (Section 5 UrhDaG) to ensure that the authors are remunerated even if the content was uploaded by users of the platform. The licensing agreements concluded by the service providers also extend to the use of the content by users of the platform (Section 6 UrhDaG). If a licence cannot be obtained from the author, the content must be blocked, and the service provider must ensure that the work will in future not be made available to the public (Sections 7 and 8 UrhDaG). Risks When Operating Repositories and Other Publication Platforms (e.g., University Presses) Repositories Under Section 3 no. 2 UrhDaG, repositories are explicitly excluded from the scope of the Act on the Copyright Liability of Online Content Sharing Service Providers. Therefore, regarding liability for infringing content, the only question is whether repositories are liable under the Telemedia Act (TMG). Liability under the Telemedia Act depends on whether the operator of a repository provides access to “content of third parties” or “own content” when making a document available for retrieval by the public via the Internet. For a repository is basically a website with special, selected content. Because of the liability privilege contained in Section 10 TMG, if the document was third-party content, the operators would not be responsible for the infringement of the rights of third parties. However, the problem here is that a document is not included in a repository without a previous process of editorial selection, and possibly preparation. Thus, as a rule, it must be at least assumed that the repository operator has adopted the document as “own content”, even if the work is attributed to the author. Hence, there is a risk that in the case of an infringement of copyright or of the exclusive rights of use of a third party (e.g., a publisher), the operator of a repository will be pursued to remove the document from the repository, cease and desist from (re-)including it in the repository, and pay compensation. The liability of repository operators for removal and cease and desist is unavoidable. However, by appropriately designing agreements with authors who offer them their documents for inclusion in the repository, repository operators can reduce the risk of financial losses due to the obligation to pay damages. In an expert report, Professor Dr. Andreas Wiebe LL.M. (Virginia) suggested the inclusion of the following wording in such agreements: The author undertakes to indemnify the repository operator for claims of third parties arising from the fact that, as a result of culpably false information provided by the author regarding the non-existence of the rights of third parties, or as a result of other circumstances for which the author is responsible, an infringement of copyright or exclusive rights of use occurs when the work is published in the repository. This shall not apply if the infringement is due to intentional or grossly negligent conduct on the part of the repository operator, and the author is not culpable of wilful intent or gross negligence in the same manner. In the latter case, the apportionment of damages shall be carried out in particular by weighing up the respective shares of fault (Wiebe, 2011, p. 113; our translation). Alternatively, the following clause, which also covers the infringement of data protection and privacy and publicity rights of third parties and includes indemnity against liability, can be used: The Licensor confirms that the above-mentioned use of the Materials and metadata does not infringe any rights of third parties (e.g., copyrights, privacy or publicity rights , data protection). If the Materials were produced collaboratively, the Licensor confirms that the content of the Agreement is known to and has been approved by all collaborators. The Licensor shall indemnify [ the repository operator ] against claims that the use of the Materials in accordance with this Agreement constitutes an infringement of the rights of third parties, insofar as the Licensor is responsible for this. The Parties shall cooperate closely to prevent infringements of the rights of third parties. Operators of repositories must provide for a “notice and take down” procedure if rights of a third party have been infringed by information included in the repository. If repository operators are contacted by injured parties, they must block and if appropriate delete the infringing content. Digital Publication Services Provided by Research Organisations Research organisations provide publication services (e.g., for scholarly monographs, open access journals, or conference proceedings), possibly for a fee, via their own publication platforms (e.g., university presses). Regarding liability under the German Telemedia Act (TMG), the same principles apply as for repositories. However, in the case of fee-based services, the question arises as to whether the Act on the Copyright Liability of Online Content Sharing Service Providers (UrhDaG) might also apply. The UrhDaG is applicable in principle only if digital publication services are provided (digital conclusion of contract, digital retrieval of publications for users). If only print publication services are provided, the UrhDaG does not apply. However, even if research organisations provide digital publication services, the UrhDaG probably does not apply. For, on the one hand, authors usually publish their own works after concluding their own licensing agreement with a university press. Thus, “copyright-protected content uploaded by third parties” (Section 2 (1) no. 1 UrhDaG) is not made available to the public online. On the other hand, the revenue earned from publication fees generally serves only to cover costs, and no additional profit is earned (e.g., directly through usage fees or indirectly through sales of user data or through advertisements). Therefore, public non-profit services in particular do not fulfil the criterion for profit orientation in Section 2 (1) no. 3 UrhDaG. Nor do research organisations that provide digital publication services for a fee meet the criteria for “service provider” as defined in Section 2 UrhDaG. However, this should be assessed on a case-by-case basis, as publication services may differ greatly in nature. Risks When Making Documents Available on a Personal Website or on Social Networks For researchers who wish to make documents they have produced themselves available to the public via their own personal websites, the greatest risk is that by so doing they will violate agreements with third parties – for example a publisher. Where an author has already granted a third party exclusive rights to make the work available to the public (online provision), they may no longer make the work available to the public online – not even via their own personal website. The same applies when researchers upload content to social networks such as X (formerly Twitter), ResearchGate, or Academia.edu. However, there is no risk involved in sharing links to content published on other websites, provided the content is not embedded in the website and it is recognisable that the links are to external or third-party websites. Where third-party content is adopted as “own content”, the liability risks for operators of private websites are the same as those for operators of repositories. References Brehm, E. (2021). Zweitveröffentlichungsrecht für Wissenschaftler*innen. [Online talk in the open-access.network series Open Access Talk] . German National Library of Science and Technology (TIB). https://av.tib.eu/media/51789 Brehm, E. (2022, October 28). Guidelines zum Text und Data Mining für Forschungszwecke in Deutschland . German National Library of Science and Technology (TIB). https://oa.tib.eu/renate/handle/123456789/10352 Communication, Information, Media Centre (KIM). (2020, July). Handreichung Zitatrecht [Handbook on the Right of Citation]. KIM, University of Konstanz. https://www.kim.uni-konstanz.de/en/openscience/publishing-and-open-access/legal-questions-when-publishing/ Rücknagel, J., & Schmeja, S. (2020, September 30). Wo und wie offen publizieren? Eine Einführung in Open Access [Online seminar in the open-access.network series Open Access Talk ]. open-access.network. https://zenodo.org/doi/10.5281/zenodo.4059961 Wiebe, A. (2011). Gesetzliche Haftung der Repositorienbetreiber und Wirkung von Haftungsfreistellungen. In R. Kuhlen & M. Seadle (Eds.), Zur urheberrechtlichen Gestaltung von Repositorien . Humboldt Universität zu Berlin. https://doi.org/10.18452/23216 Content editor of this page: Elke Brehm, TIB – Leibniz Information Centre for Science and Technology and University Library (Last updated: January 2024)....

Intro Numerous legal questions arise in connection with open access policies and the operation of open access repositories and open access journals . On this page, you will find information on the legal frameworks in Switzerland that are of relevance in the context of open access . Please note that the content presen­ted here is intended for information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Copyright Legal Bases and Sources From a Swiss perspective, the relevant legal bases are the Swiss Copyright Act (CopA) and several international agreements, in particular the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty (WCT) and the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works as amended on September 28, 1979 . Object The object of protection of the Swiss Copyright Act (CopA) are works in the sense of "intellectual creations" ( Art. 2(1) CopA ), irrespective of their embodiment in a copy of the work. In the case of an article, for example, it is not the article in a particular graphical layout that is protected, but rather the article "in and of itself". Intellectual creations enjoy protection under the Swiss Copyright Act only to the extent that they have "individual character" ( Art. 2(1) CopA ). In the case of scientific works, which are specifically mentioned in the act ( Art. 2(2) points a and d CopA ), the individual character is to be found not so much in the content of the work – for the content is strongly determined by material logic – but rather in the concrete linguistic or stylistic presen­tation, in the wording and organisation of the material. As a rule, scholarly publications enjoy copyright protection provided they are not a mere compilation of data. The Swiss Copyright Act comprises a number of partial rights ( Arts 9–15 CopA ). They include, first, the exploitation rights, for example the right to produce and distribute copies of the protected work and to make it avail­able ( Art. 10 CopA ). Moreover, the author has the right to recognition of authorship; the right to decide whether, when, how and under what designation the work should be published for the first time ( Art. 9 CopA ); and the right to the integrity of the work ( Art. 11 CopA ). In addition, there are rights that refer to individual copies of works ( Arts 13–15 CopA ), for example the right of access to the original. The individual rights can in turn be further subdivided. In the case of open access uses, and the agreements concluded in this connection, it is necessary in each case to check exactly which partial rights under Swiss copyright law are affected. There are certain exceptions to copyright ( Art. 19 and seq. CopA ). Provi­ded the use of a work is covered by one of these exceptions, it may take place freely, that is, without the consent of the copyright holder. How­ever, the use of the work may be subject to remuneration (e.g. Art. 20 CopA ). Of interest for open access uses are, in particular, the exceptions with regard to private use ( Art. 19(1) point a CopA ), use in enterprises ( Art. 19(1) point c CopA ), and the making of archive copies ( Art. 24(1) and (1bis) CopA ). Source: Hilty, R. M. and Seemann, M. (2009). Open Access – Zugang zu wissenschaftlichen Publikationen im schweizerischen Recht (Expert opinion on open access commissioned by the University of Zurich). https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-30945 Right of Quotation In accordance with the exception to copyright provided for in Article 25(1) of the Swiss Copyright Act, published works (text, images, audio, film, etc.) may be quoted by anyone if the quotation "serves as an explanation, a reference or an illustration" (so-called documentary function of the quotation). A quotation that serves only as a decorative illustration – for example a figure that has no substantive connection to the text – is not permissible. Moreover, the size of the quotation must be justified by its purpose. In other words, only as much of a work may be quoted as is needed. In individual cases, this may be an entire work, for example a poem, if that is necessary for an analysis of the text. Quoting means using – as a rule, an excerpt from – a protected work , word for word, note for note, etc. Conversely, this means that works that are not, or that are no longer, protected by copyright may be quoted without regard to Article 25 of the Swiss Copyright Act. So-called paraphrasing is not regulated by the exception with regard to freedom of quotation ( Art. 25 CopA ), either. Paraphrasing means merely restating or summarising the meaning of a (protected) textual work in another form. In contrast to quoting, when paraphrasing a text, one restates the content in one’s own words. Quotations must be designated as such, and the source must be given ( Art. 25(2) CopA ). Moreover, provided the author can be determined from the reference, they must be named. A person who does not identify a quotation as such is guilty of plagiarism because they claim to be the author of the text, the image, etc. Authors whose rights are infringed in this way can defend themselves on the basis of Article 68 of the Swiss Copyright Act. Source: Kompetenzzentrum für digitales Recht (n.d.). Grundlagen des Urheberrechts: 5.5 Das Zitatrecht. https://ccdigitallaw.ch/index.php/german/chapters/5/55-das-zitatrecht Making Documents Available in Repositories A question that authors and repository operators alike often ask themselves in practice is: Are we allowed to make this document available to the public in repositories ? Although many publishers allow self-archiving in principle, policies in this regard vary from publisher to publisher. The Open Policy Finder database provides details of publishers’ and journals’ open access archiving policies. Although it is unlikely that a publisher that does not allow a preprint or post-print of a work to be made available online will take legal steps to force its own authors to delete it, it is advisable to be legally on the safe side by checking on a case-by-case basis whether there are any legal impediments to self-archiving. In the following, we provide an overview of the legal aspects that must be considered. Self-Archiving of Articles That Have Already Been Published in a Journal When self-archiving articles that have already been published in a jour­nal, authors are often obliged by the publisher to observe an embargo period between the date of publication and the date on which the work is made available in open access. Other conditions that may be imposed by the publisher relate to the version of the work that may be self-archi­ved, and the inclusion of an addendum acknowledging the published source. For example, it is quite common for publishers to allow the au­thor’s accepted manuscript version (also known as the post-print) to be self-archived in parallel with the publication of the article by the publi­sher. The author’s accepted manuscript (AAM) is the final author ver­sion after peer review and acceptance for publication but before format­ting by the publisher. In contrast to the preprint – that is, the version sub­mitted to the publisher, which has not yet been peer reviewed – the post-print does not usually differ substantively from the publisher’s ver­sion (also known as the published journal article or the version of record). Some publishers now allow immediate self-archiving subject to certain terms and conditions. Authors whose publishing agreements include such passages should state them when depositing their articles in repositories. The passages in question are often specific addenda that are to be attached to the articles when they are being self-archived. Example : If you wish to post your version of this article within your institutional repository please include the following wording: Author Posting. (c) Publisher X, YYYY. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of Publisher X for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of XXX, VolumeXX Issue X, Month YYYY. https : / /doi.org/XX.XXXX/XXXXXXX ( Link to the DOI ). In Switzerland, if no agreement on copyright was concluded when the article was being published in a scholarly journal, the provisions of publi­shing contract law contained in the Swiss Code of Obligations (OR) apply. Article 382(3) of the Code of Obligations states: "Contributions to collections or anthologies and relatively lengthy magazine articles must not be published elsewhere by the originator within three months of the appearance in print of such contribution or article." Therefore, the authors of scholarly contributions, for example journal articles, may self-archive them in a repository or on another server three months after publication, provided the works deal with a topic in depth. In any case, the author’s accepted manuscript version (post-print) may be used for this purpose. According to the expert opinion by Reto Hilty and Matthias Seemann , the published version (publisher’s PDF, version of record) may also be used, albeit without the publisher’s logo, which is protected by trademark law. However, there is no established judicial practice on the question of format. It should be noted that in international constellations, for example in the case of a document server outside Switzerland, a foreign legal system may apply. Self-Archiving of Contributions That Have Already Been Published in Collections or Anthologies If an agreement on copyright, for example in a written publishing agree­ment, is concluded when publishing a contribution in a collection or an anthology (e.g. in a festschrift), the terms and conditions of that agreement apply. Otherwise, the same holds as for the self-archiving of journal articles: The provisions of publishing contract law contained in the Swiss Code of Obligations (OR) apply. Article 382(3) of the Code of Obligations states: "Contributions to collections or anthologies and relatively lengthy maga­zine articles must not be published elsewhere by the originator within three months of the appearance in print of such contribution or article." Therefore, authors may self-archive scholarly contributions, for example book chapters, in a repository or on another server three months after publication, provided the works deal with a topic in depth. In any case, the author’s accepted manuscript version (post-print) may be used. According to the expert opinion by Reto Hilty and Matthias Seemann , the published version (publisher’s PDF, version of record) may also be used, albeit without the publisher’s logo, which is protected by trademark law. However, there is no established judicial practice on the question of format. It should be noted that in international constellations, for example in the case of a document server outside Switzerland, a foreign legal system may apply. Many publishers now allow the self-archiving of such contributions even if the authors were paid a fee. It may therefore be worthwhile to enquire with the publisher. Self-Archiving of Articles That Have Already Been Published in a Newspaper If an agreement on copyright, for example in a written publishing agree­ment, is concluded when publishing an article in a newspaper, the terms and conditions of that agreement apply. Otherwise, in Switzerland, the provisions of publishing contract law contained in the Swiss Code of Obligations (OR) apply. Article 382(2) of the Code of Obligations states: "Newspaper articles or relatively short passages of magazine copy may be published elsewhere by the origina­tor at any time." This means that topical reports, for example newspaper articles, may be made available to the public in a repository or on another server at any time. In any case, the author’s accepted manuscript version (post-script) may be used. According to the expert opinion by Reto Hilty and Matthias Seemann , the published version (publisher’s PDF, version of record) may also be used, albeit without the publisher's logo, which is protected by trademark law. However, there is no estab­lished judicial practice on the question of format. It should be noted that in international constellations, for example in the case of a document server outside Switzerland, a foreign legal system may apply. Self-Archiving of Published Monographs If an agreement on copyright, for example in a written publishing agree­ment, is concluded when publishing a monograph, the terms and condi­tions of that agreement apply. Otherwise, in Switzerland, the provisions of publishing contract law contained in the Swiss Code of Obligations (OR) apply. Article 382(1) of the Code of Obligations states: "As long as the editions of the work to which the publisher is entitled have not yet been exhausted, the origina­tor may not make other arrangements regarding the work or parts there­of to the publisher’s detriment." Therefore, authors may not make works such as monographs or textbooks available in open access in a reposito­ry in competition with the publisher as long as the edition is still in print. The self-archiving of versions that cannot be properly cited, and are there­fore no real competition, is permitted. Such versions include, for example, files without original page numbers in disciplines where citations include exact page numbers. It should be noted that in international constellations, for example in the case of a document server outside Switzerland, a foreign legal system may apply. In the case of older monographs, it is worthwhile to enquire with the publishers, as it is possible that publication of the book has been discontinued or that the publishers have no objection to the monograph being deposited in a repository. Dissertations Most Swiss universities facilitate the digital publishing of dissertations. As a rule, responsibility for digital publishing lies with the university libraries, where you will obtain the information you need. Authors are entitled to publish their dissertations under the terms of an open licence . However, if parts of the dissertation have already been – or are to be – published elsewhere, the terms and conditions of the corresponding publishing agreements or the dispositive statutory provisions must be complied with, and the submission instructions of the respective journals or publishers must be observed. It may therefore be appropriate to make only individual parts of the dissertation available in a repository and to withhold access to other parts. Moreover, the doctoral regulations of the respective universities or faculties apply. International Constellations Within the limits laid down by the Swiss Federal Act on International Private Law (PILA) and the Lugano Convention , authors and publishers may reach an agreement on jurisdiction and applicable law. In the absence of such an agreement, it must first be clarified whether Swiss jurisdiction applies, which is the case, for example, if the author against whom an action has been brought, is domiciled in Switzerland. The competent court in Switzerland then determines the applicable law in accordance with the Swiss Federal Act on International Private Law (PILA). A distinction should be made here between matters of contract law (that concern a publishing agreement) and specifically copyright matters (that concern copyright). In matters of contract law, the legal system of the state where the publisher has its establishment applies ( Art. 117(2) PILA ). In copyright matters, the principle of the law of the country where protection is sought applies ( Art. 110(1) PILA ). If, for example, the removal of a certain publication from a repository in Switzerland is requested, Swiss law applies; in the case of a repository in Germany, German law applies. Liability Law Liability for Copyright Infringements on the Internet The Internet-based channels of scholarly communication also give rise to the question of who is liable in the event of an infringement for the infor­mation that has been made available to the public. It is important to de­termine the consequences under liability law that may arise for the ope­rators of repositories, or for authors who make their documents avail­able online. In this way, the liability risks can be assessed in advance and limited by means of appropriate practices or contractual arrangements. Liability Risks when Operating Institutional Repositories The tasks of institutional repositories generally comprise depositing, managing and making available to the public documents produced by scholars and scientists of the respective universities or research organi­sations. When a document is registered in an institutional repository, it is not available online immediately. Rather, it undergoes quality assurance procedures, the extent of which vary from repository to repository. They may range from checking the metadata, through indexing and catalo­guing, to substantive checks (on quality assurance in electronic archives in general, see the DINI Certificate for Open Access Publication Services 2019 and CoreTrustSeal ) Legal Consequences for Repository Operators If repository operators make scholarly works accessible without holding the necessary copyrights, they are guilty of an infringement of copyright. In this case, in Switzerland, legal remedies are available to the entitled party under Article 61 and seq. of the Federal Copyright Act (CopA). In particular, the entitled party may bring an action against the repository operator requesting that the infringement of copyright be remedied ( Art. 62(1) point b CopA). Thus, the repository operator may be obliged to remove the works in question from the repository. Also possible are financial consequences because of actions brought un­der the Swiss Code of Obligations; these actions remain reserved under Article 62(2) CopA . The main issue here are claims for damages with which, for example, the publisher wants to be compensated by the repo­sitory for the loss of profits resulting from the copyright infringement ( Art. 62(2) CopA in conjunction with Art. 41 and seq. CopA ). However, the entitled party must be able to prove this loss, which is likely to be difficult in practice because the establishment of a causal relationship between the action of the repository operator and losses on the part of the publisher will hardly be possible. The holder of the infringed partial right ( Art. 62 (1) CopA ) or of an exclu­sive copyright licence ( Art. 62 (3) CopA ) is entitled to institute procee­dings. In the case of the making available of a work in a repository, the rights in question are the online rights, which are usually held by the author or the publisher. Thus, it is usually the author or the publisher that is entitled to institute proceedings Under Swiss law, the defendants may not only be the operator of the repository but also other persons who participated in the copyright infringement. In other words, not only may the principal infringer be sued but also instigators or accomplices (see Art. 50(1) of the Code of Obligations ). If the online rights in a work are held, for example, by the publisher, and if the author nevertheless made the work available to the public in a repository, both the author and the repository operator may be sued. In the case of a claim for damages, the repository operator and the author would then be jointly and severally liable ( Art. 50(1) of the Code of Obligations). The claimant may choose the party against whom they wish to bring an action and may decide whether they wish to request partial or full performance of the obligation from that party ( Art. 144(1) of the Code of Obligations ). Shifting the Legal Consequences to the Author Repository operators may contractually pass on to the author the risk of being sued for monetary damages because of infringements of the rights of third parties. This is done by means of a contractual clause whereby the author undertakes to hold the repository harmless in the event of legal claims by third parties – that is, to bear the costs incurred or to pay possible compensation for damage. From a practical point of view, it should be borne in mind that shifting the risk to the author in this way may reduce the attractiveness of the reposi­tory, and that fewer authors may be willing to make their works available to the public in the repository as a result. For authors, it is probably not always clear from their publishing agreements with publishers whether they are entitled to self-archive the works in a repository in parallel with publication. Therefore, the way in which liability for infringements is distributed is a key point in the agreement between the author and the repository operators. Where no agreement on liability for infringements has been made bet­ween the repository operators and the author, the repository operators have recourse against the author only to the extent that the author is jointly responsible for the copyright infringement (and could therefore also be sued directly). Such joint responsibility is usually present if the document was deposited by the author themselves or with their consent. The respective shares that must be assumed by the repository operators and the authors are determined in the particular case by the court at its discretion ( Art. 50(2) of the Code of Obligations ). In this context, the repository operators are classified as content provi­ders, whose service goes beyond the mere technical storage and making available of documents that is performed by mere access providers. However, even a content provider is liable only to the extent that they failed to take possible and reasonable measures to prevent the infringe­ments of rights. Repository operators can be reasonably expected to cla­rify the entitlement to the individual works under copyright law, and, if they are informed of infringements, to endeavour to remedy them. However, it would not be reasonable to expect repository operators to furthermore take note of the content of each individual work. Liability Risks When Self-Archiving on a Website Self-archiving in the sense of self-posting refers to the individual, non-standardised archiving and making available to the public of publications, for example on the website of a university department or an institute, or on a private website. Possible infringements when self-posting include in particular the viola­tion of intellectual property rights, for example the copyrights or moral rights of third parties. When university members self-archive their works on their personal websites, the question of the responsibility of the university does not arise provided it does not operate the website and is not responsible for the content of the publication. Open Access Helpdesk Ask your specific questions about Open Access here. References Hilty, R. M. und Seemann, M. (2009). Open Access - Zugang zu wissenschaftlichen Publikationen im schweizerischen Recht (Rechtsgutachten zu Open Access, erstellt im Auftrag der Universität Zürich). https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-30945 Kompetenzzentrum für digitales Recht (n.d.). Grundlagen des Urheberrechts: 5a.6 Das Zitatrecht. https://www.ccdigitallaw.ch/56-utilisation-doeuvres-orphelines/?lang=de Bundesversammlung der Schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft (2020). Bundesgesetz über das Urheberrecht und verwandte Schutzrechte – Urheberrechtsgesetz (URG) . https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/1993/1798_1798_1798/de Bundesversammlung der Schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft (2021). Bundesgesetz betreffend die Ergänzung des Schweizerischen Zivilgesetzbuches – Fünfter Teil: Obligationenrecht. https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/27/317_321_377/de Bundesversammlung der Schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft (2021). Bundesgesetz über das Internationale Privatrecht (IPRG). https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/eli/cc/1988/1776_1776_1776/de Further Reading Kompetenzzentrum für digitales Recht (n.d.). Grundlagen des Urheberrechts. https://ccdigitallaw.ch/index.php/german Content editor of this page: André Hoffmann, Zurich University Library (Last updated: August 2021)....

Intro What are Preprints? Preprints are preliminary versions, or manuscript versions, of scholarly works – especially journal articles – that are made available to the (professional) public. As a rule, they are non- peer-reviewed versions whose public release primarily serves to expedite the sharing of research findings. Preprints are made freely available to the public on preprint servers, thereby also making an important contribution to green open access . Quelle: Becklas, Carolin; Hauss, Jonas (2025): Was sind Preprints? av.tib.eu/media/69857 The key takeaways from this article are 1 Preprints are early versions of scholarly publications that are made available to the (professional) public – as a rule without prior peer review. 2 Preprints, which are particularly common in physics and other natural sciences, are made freely available to the public on preprint servers and make an important contribution to green open access. 3 Preprint servers enable the publishing of so-called overlay journals – that is, online journals that use the infrastructure of a preprint platform for submissions and publication. Characteristics of Preprints Many months may elapse between the submission of a manuscript and its publication in a journal. According to one study ( Huisman & Smits, 2017 ), the average duration of the peer-review process is 17 weeks. In addition, time is needed for typesetting and, if applicable, copy-editing and printing. In order to expedite the dissemination of research findings, preprints are shared in many disciplines. However, cultures differ greatly across disciplines. In physics , preprints are an indispensable communication tool – depending on the subfield, preliminary versions of over 90% of all journal articles are made available to the public on the preprint server arXiv prior to publication of the final version ( Gentil-Beccot et al., 2009 ). By contrast, authors in other disciplines have not yet adopted a comparable preprint culture. It may be that not all journals in these disciplines accept manuscripts that have previously been posted as a preprint. As a rule, preprints have not yet undergone any scholarly quality assurance processes. Substantively, they may therefore differ considerably from the published versions, or they may not even be accepted for publication. While scholars and scientists are aware of this, problems may arise if, for example, the media pick up findings from preprints and disseminate them to a large audience without indicating that they are preliminary and have not been peer reviewed. To enable non-scientific readers to better understand the nature of preprints, medical preprint servers display caution statements. Source: Based on: Shafee, Thomas (2020). Typical publishing workflow for an academic journal article (preprint, postprint, and published) with open access sharing rights per SHERPA/RoMEO. Own work; adapted from diagram by Ginny Barbour Wikimedia Commons ( CC BY 4.0 International ) Preprint Servers There are numerous preprint servers. The following figure shows some commonly used ones: Source: Khurana, S. (2020). Commonly used pre-print servers for researchers Zenodo Zenodo is a universal data repository. Much of the material on this website is also accessible here in the Zenodo collection open-access.network . In principle, preprints can be disseminated through all possible channels, for example, email, institutional repositories , or research institution websites. As a rule, they are uploaded to preprint servers, which are usually dedicated to one or more specialist fields. Although no peer review takes place on these plat­forms, uploaded publications usually undergo a basic screening process to ensure that they are scientific and fit the disciplinary scope of the server. Pre­print servers have often emerged from and are financed by scientific commu­nities. Some are operated by research institutions or professional societies. Only rarely are they operated by publishers. The oldest and largest preprint server is arXiv , an open access repository for scholarly articles in eight subject areas, including physics , mathematics , and computer science , that was founded in 1991. As of April 2021, arXiv hosted over 1.8 million documents. Other important preprint platforms are bioRxiv ( biology ), SocArXiv ( social sciences ), EarthArXiv ( geosciences ), medRxiv ( medicine ), and ChemRxiv ( chemistry ). Functionalities differ across platforms. As a rule, revised versions of papers can be uploaded – for example, after acceptance by a journal – and a link can be provided to the final published version ( version of record ). Some platforms also offer a comments function so that authors can receive feedback, and findings can be discussed in the community. History As early as the 1960s, there was a system in biology whereby reports of current research findings – especially in the form of preprints – were reproduced and circulated by postal mail by a central registry ( Cobb, 2017 ). A similar system also existed in the field of high-energy physics ( Gentil-Beccot et al., 2009 ). With the advent of the Internet, the sharing of manuscripts became much easier, as they could be circulated via email. In 1991, Paul Ginsparg founded arXiv at Los Alamos National Laboratory as a server for preprints from high-energy physics ( Ginsparg, 2017 ). The manuscripts were thus freely available to all interested parties. The scope of arXiv was later extended to include other areas of physics, as well as mathematics, computer science, and neighbouring fields such as quantitative finance and quantitative biology. It was only after the turn of the century that other fields followed arXiv’s lead. For example, in 2013, bioRxiv was launched as a preprint server for biology, thereby making preprint sharing more popular in the life sciences . The initiative ASAPbio advocates the use of preprints in biology. Boosted by the success of the Open Science Framework (OSF) – an open source infrastructure that, inter alia, enables preprints to be uploaded and searched for – there has been a veritable boom in preprint servers for the most diverse subject areas since 2016. Nonetheless, the acceptance of preprints and the willingness to share them varies greatly across disciplines. During the COVID-19 pandemic, preprints have played an important role in the rapid dissemination, checking, and correction of research findings on the SARS-CoV-2 virus ( Fraser et al., 2020; Gianola et al., 2020 ). This chart on preprints in the life sciences illustrates how strongly the importance of preprints has increased in recent years: Source: Polka, Jessica K., & Penfold, Naomi C. (2020). Biomedical preprints per month, by source and as a fraction of total literature (3.0) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3819276 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) History of Open Access Find an introduction here. Preprints and Open Science Click on the picture to watch the video. Video about Preprints. Source: Youreka Science (2016). What Are Preprints? YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zMgY8Dx9co In contrast to journal articles, which are often behind paywalls, preprints are freely accessible in the long term and are thus a key component of green open access. When a journal article is not freely accessible, the preprint version can be found via services like Unpaywall provided it is linked to the publisher’s version (the version of record). Preprints also make the process of gaining and communicating scientific knowledge more transparent. They enable critical discussion of works in the community before final publication Thus, authors can receive and take into account feedback in addition to the actual peer reviews. Preprints thus form the basis for informal or formalised open peer review ( Frick, 2020 ). Overlay Journals Preprint servers enable the publishing of so-called overlay journals ( Gowers, 2015 ) – that is, online journals that use the infrastructure of a preprint platform, especially arXiv, for submissions and publication. Authors post their papers on arXiv and submit a link to the arXiV preprint to the journal in question, which then organises the review process. If the paper is accepted, it is included in the journal – that is, it is linked from the journal website and assigned a DOI and possibly a comment from the editor. In this way, the advantages of arXiv (cost-effective, freely accessible, well-known infrastructure) are combined with those of a journal (peer-review, reputation, possibly an Impact Factor). Successful examples of overlay journals are SIGMA (Symmetry, Integrability and Geometry: Methods and Applications) , Logical Methods in Computer Science (LMCS) , Discrete Analysis , and Quantum . open-access.network ( CC BY 4.0 International ) References Cobb, M. (2017). The prehistory of biology preprints: A forgotten experiment from the 1960s. PLOS Biology , 15 (11). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.2003995 Fraser, N., Brierley, L., Dey, G., Polka, J. K., Pálfy, M., Nanni, F., & Coates, J. A. (2021). Preprinting the COVID-19 pandemic . bioRxiv. https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.05.22.111294 Frick, C. (2020). Peer-Review im Rampenlicht. Ein prominentes Fallbeispiel. Informationspraxis , 6 (2). https://doi.org/10.11588/ip.2020.2.74406 Gentil-Beccot, A., Mele, S., & Brooks, T. (2009). Citing and reading behaviours in high-energy physics. How a community stopped worrying about journals and learned to love repositories . arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/0906.5418 Gianola, S., Jesus, T. S., Bargeri, S., & Castellini, G. (2020). Characteristics of academic publications, preprints, and registered clinical trials on the COVID-19 pandemic. PLoS ONE , 15 (10). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0240123 Ginsparg, P. (2017). Preprint déjà vu: An FAQ . arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/1706.04188 Gowers, T. (2015, September 10). Discrete Analysis – An arXiv overlay journal. Gowers’s Weblog . https://gowers.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/discrete-analysis-an-arxiv-overlay-journal/ Huisman, J., & Smits, J. (2017). Duration and quality of the peer review process: The author’s perspective. Scientometrics , 113 , 633–650. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-017-2310-5 Further Reading Ettinger, C., Sadanandappa, M. K., Görgülü, K., Coghlan, K., Hallenbeck, K. K., & Puebla, I. (2022). A guide to preprinting for Early Career Researchers [OSF Preprints]. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/e59tk...

Intro The Path a Publication Takes Source: based on Rücknagel, J. & Schmeja, S. (2021). Open Access Basics - How to publish and What to Consider? (S.4). Zenodo. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4530414 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) The key takeaways from this article are 1 Authors can make their publications freely available by publishing them open access or by self-archiving them in an open access repository. 2 When choosing a publication venue, criteria such as thematic focus, quality, and costs should be considered. 3 When self-archiving, authors should grant third parties rights of use in the works. Scientific Publishing Only when authors publish their research results do their findings achieve visibility and can thus be adequately recognised and cited. For a long time, publishing works in print media – for example, as journal articles, monographs, or contributions to collections – was the most common way of permanently recording and disseminating scholarly and scientific information. Through the possibility of electronic publication, and especially through open access , a large number of alternative publication options have arisen. This significantly increases the citation frequency, and thus also the visibility, of research results ( Swan, 2010; Li et al., 2018 ). The aspects that should be considered when publishing open access or when self-archiving in an open access repository are outlined in what follows. Scientists can actively support the change to open science through their own publishing behavior. This practical tip "Supporting Open Access" explains how. Practical Tip What variants of open access publishing are there? Which ones are suitable for me? Where can I publish in accordance with the principles of open access? How do I find a suitable journal? What do research funders expect? You can find the answers in the presentation " Open Access Basics – How to Publish and What to Consider? " Practical Tip The AuROA catalogue of services ( Leistungskatalog ) offers a compilation of possible individual tasks and services in the open access publishing process. AuROA (Authors and Legal Certainty for Open Access) is a project that between 2021 and 2023 addressed the heterogeneous and complex needs, perspectives and demands of open access publishing in book-oriented disciplines. Publication Routes Source: based on Oberländer, A. (2020). Open Access – Es ist nicht alles Gold, was glänzt. In: Open Science. Von Daten zu Publikationen. Zenodo. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4018594 ( CC BY 4.0 International ) The road to publication usually starts with the decision as to how the research results should be published. There are many reasons in favour of open access publishing; they are summarised on the Reasons and Reservations page. Basically, two different open access strategies can be distinguished: gold open access and green open access . Gold open access refers to the publication of scholarly works as articles in open access journals , as open access monographs , or as contributions to open access collections or conference proceedings. This literature is freely available and reusable immediately, without an embargo period . Green open access means making research results freely available by self-archiving them in an institutional or disciplinary repository . This can also be done in parallel with or after publication in a journal or with a publisher. Choosing a Publication Venue Several parameters play a role when choosing a publication venue. These parameters are largely the same for closed access and open access publications. They include the thematic focus of the venue; the type of quality assurance it employs; its reputation in the field; and, if applicable, the licensing conditions under which the publications are made available and the level of any publication fees that may be charged. In the context of open access, research funders’ requirements increasingly play a role. Among funders, one finds not only regulations whereby grant holders should provide open access to the scholarly publications arising from funded research, but sometimes also specific requirements with regard to publication venues ( Dreher, 2020; Rücknagel, 2021 ). Further information on research funders’ policies and a list of funding organisations can be found on the Financing page . Die Vorteile einer Open-Access-Dissertation Quelle: Becklas, C., Hauss, J. (2024): Die Vorteile einer Open Access Dissertation. open-access.network, Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB) et al. https://doi.org/10.5446/68305#t=00:00,01:15 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Source: Translation of a flowchart by Brinken, H. & Rücknagel, J. (2021). Open Access – Das sind Ihre Möglichkeiten für die Publikation von Artikeln. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5045255 ( CC BY-SA 4.0 ). Practical Tip The following tools can be helpful in finding suitable OA publication venues for your own manuscript: oa.finder (a tool for searching for scholarly publication venues; developed as a project by open-access.network ) B!SON (Open Access journal recommender, developed by TIB and SLUB Dresden ) Gold Open Access Finding Suitable Journals/Publishers If the intention is to publish a work open access (gold OA), for example, as a journal article, a monograph, or a contribution to a collection, it is advisable to first search for thematically suitable journals or publishers with open access offerings. On our web page Subject-Specific Open Access , we provide discipline-specific information that can offer helpful introductory pointers. Open access journals can be searched via the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) or the Electronic Journals Library (EZB) . For open access books, the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) and the online library and publication platform OAPEN are first ports of call. Suitable publication venues can also be found in conversation with colleagues. If a publisher does not offer a gold open access option, it is often worthwhile enquiring specifically whether it would allow the article to be self-archived in a repository. Quality Criteria Open access publications undergo the same quality assurance proce­dures as traditional publications. The review procedures do not differ either: from classical peer review and editorial review to open review procedures – everything can be found here. The German-language publication Qualitätsstandards für Open-Access-Monografien und -Sammelbände ( AG Universitätsverlage, 2018 ) offers guidance when choosing a suitable publisher for open access books. When choosing a journal, the German-language checklist on the quality of open access journals provided by Brinken et al. (2021) can help when assessing its quality. Further information in this regard can be found on the Open Access Journals and Open Access for Monographs pages. The impact and visibility of scholarly publications play an important role for the reputational gains and thus for the career prospects of individual scholars and scientists. Studies show that the citation frequency of open access publications is usually much higher than that of their closed access counterparts. Overviews in this regard are provided by the Open Access Citation Advantage Service and by Piwowar and colleagues’ Large-Scale Analysis of the Prevalence and Impact of Open Access Articles ( Piwowar et al., 2018 ). Journal Impact Factors , a metric of the citation frequency of articles in scholarly journals, are published in the annual publication Journal Citation Reports , which also covers open access journals. So-called altmetrics have emerged as an alternative to the traditional bibliometric indicators. They capture the diverse reactions to a scholarly publication on the Web. Financing In contrast to closed access, where libraries and users pay for access, open access publications are financed in a different way. The so-called author-pays model, whereby authors pay article processing charges (APCs) or book processing charges (BPCs) to have their works published, is very common in the open access context. To find out whether, or what level of, author fees are charged, it is usually helpful to check the website of the journal or publisher. If a journal indexed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) charges APCs, details are deposited in the journal record. However, a large percentage of open access journals indexed in DOAJ are free of charge both for readers and authors ( Morrison, 2018 ). These journals are financed, for example, by professional societies, academic institutions, library consortia, or – in kind – by voluntary work. For open access books, university presses run by universities or their libraries, and publishing initiatives established by scholars and scientists (e.g. the consortium ScholarLed ) are an affordable and high quality alternative to commercial publishers. Detailed information on financing open access articles and books can be found on the Financing page. Many research institutions have a publication fund from which open access publication fees can be paid. The management of the funds is usually located at the institutions’ libraries. In addition, some open access publishers offer institutional membership, which is similar to a discount model. Institutions pay an annual membership fee, thereby enabling their members to publish their works in the journal in question free of charge or for a reduced fee. Moreover, via transformative agreements with commercial publishers, such as those negotiated by the German initiative Projekt Deal , contractually agreed fees for individual hybrid open access articles in subscription journals are increasingly borne by library consortia. Information on this is provided by the open access officers at the respective institutions . The funding of genuine open access models by consortia is increasingly moving into focus: the costs are borne by a consortium, and no publication fees are payable by authors, irrespective of whether their institutions participate in the financing. In addition to funding research, some funding organisations also bear publication costs for articles in scholarly journals and other publications. When submitting a funding proposal to the German Research Foundation (DFG) , application can also be made for a publication grant. The Austrian Science Fund (FWF) and the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) have established dedicated funding programmes to finance open access articles and books. The Volkswagen Foundation also bears the publication costs incurred by the projects it funds and expects grant recipients to publish open access. International funding organisations, such as the Wellcome Trust , as well as the EU framework programme Horizon 2020 , reimburse publication charges for open access articles within the framework of their funding. In addition, the Open Access Books Toolkit provides a l ist of funding sources for open access books . Practical Tip An overview of the requirements that open access journals must fulfil and concrete criteria that authors can use as a guide when choosing a suitable publication venue, can be found in the presentation " Publishing Open Access: How to evaluate a journal's quality ". Research Funders and Open Access Find an introduction here. Video on the Funding of Open Access Articles Source: Becklas Dorow, C., Hauss, J. (2026). Funding Open Access Articles – What Are the Options?. Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB), open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/73596 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Finanzierung von Open-Access-Monographien Quelle: Brinken, H. (2020). Finanzierung von Open-Access-Monographien, open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/49535 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Self-Archiving (Green Open Access) It is not always possible to publish open access, for example, when no suitable open access journal is available. A publication can nonetheless be made freely available by self-archiving it in an open access repository. In this way, the author can comply with the open access mandate of a funding organisation or their own institution, and the publication can be made freely accessible to everyone worldwide. Finding a Suitable Repository The self-archiving of publications can take place in institutional or disciplinary repositories. The Information for Different Disciplines page lists the repositories available in the respective disciplines. The Open Directory of Open Access Repositories (OpenDOAR) and the Registry of Open Access Repositories (ROAR) also provide overviews. Authors do not have to pay any charges to make their publications available in an institutional or disciplinary repository, nor do readers have to pay to access these publications. What specifically needs to be considered when (self-)archiving can be read by country in our legal section . Self-Archiving Rights Most publishers allow their authors to make their works available in repositories in parallel with publication. The Sherpa Romeo database provides an overview of the open access policies of many journal publishers. Publishers often allow the author’s final version after peer-review (author’s accepted manuscript, AAM) or the published version to be self-archived. Publishing agreements should be drafted in such a way that the authors reserve the right to self-archive their works online in a freely accessible way. Ideally, authors should grant the publisher only non-exclusive rather than exclusive rights of use for the intended types of use. If this is not possible, and no alternative publishing option is available, authors can consider attaching an addendum to the publishing agreement in order to reserve a non-exclusive right to use the work online in a repository. Various possible solutions to this problem are available on the Publishing Agreements page. Under Section 38 of the German Act on Copyright and Related Rights (UrhG) , authors of scientific contributions that result from research activities at least half of which were financed by public funds, and that were published in a collection that appears periodically at least twice a year, have the right to self-archive them in an open access repository upon expiry of 12 months after publication. According to this statutory provision on self-archiving , it is therefore possible in these cases to make these works available in a repository even if the publishers have been granted exclusive rights of use ( Brehm, 2021 ). A German-language guide issued by the Communication, Information, Media Centre (KIM) at the University of Konstanz provides an overview of the topic of self-archiving. Self-archiving is easier when a work is published in an open access journal or with an open access publisher. As a rule, they allow the work to also be made available in a repository provided the place of publication is credited. Find Repositories on OpenDOAR Click here. Legal Questions Find an introduction here. Legal Parameters Wie genau funktionieren Creative-Commons-Lizenzen? Quelle: Brinken, H., Hauss, J. & Rücknagel, J. (2021). Wie genau funktionieren Creative-Commons-Lizenzen? open-access.network. https://doi.org/10.5446/52952 ( CC BY 3.0 DE ) Source: Foter (2015). How To Attribute Creative Commons Photos ( CC BY-SA 3.0 ) Authors who wish to make their works available in open access should observe several legal parameters. Of central importance is that the authors themselves have the right to exploit their works online. However, this is not necessarily a given in standard publishing agreements. An overview of the legal situation in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland can be found on the Legal Issues page, which provides information on copyright, making documents available in repositories, publishing agreements, licences, liability law, and data protection. Open Access Licences One important aspect of open access is the reuse of publications. In order to make it clear what rights third parties have when (re-)using research results, user licences are granted. It is up to the authors themselves to decide what degree of freedom of use of their works they wish to allow. It is recommended that they allow a free worldwide right of access to and reuse of the publication. The granting of open licences by authors should take place in consultation with the respective publishers or, if applicable, in compliance with the repositories’ licensing requirements. In the area of science and research, the open Creative Commons (CC) are the most common. An overview of various open content licensing models can be found on our Licences page . The use of licences to grant specific rights of use facilitates law enforcement in the case of misuse and gives users explicit indications as to how the document in question may be reused. At the same time, the author reserves the right to permit in separate agreements further uses that go beyond those specified in the licence. Predatory Journals Unfortunately, there are also journals that exploit publication charges. These predatory journals , which are founded by so-called predatory publishers, try – sometimes massively – to attract researchers to publish in their journals. However, they do not observe the usual standards of good scientific practice. Hence, there is no quality assurance, for example, in the form of peer review, nor is there adequate editing. Thus, predatory journals damage science and scholarship because they also publish poor-quality contributions whose compliance with academic or ethical standards has not been checked. As publications in these dubious journals can cause substantial damage to the reputations of scholars and scientists, they are urgently advised against submitting manuscripts to them. Source: Monash Health Library. Predatory Publishing A-Z Elements ( CC BY-NC 4.0 ) Online course Find the online course Predatory Journals: Identify, Avoid, and Publish Safely here Practical Tip Recognising Predatory Journals It is not always easy for authors to recognise whether a journal is predatory or not, because the providers often go to a lot of trouble to make their journals appear trustworthy. On professional-looking websites, sometimes entire editorial boards are given false names or well-known researchers are listed as editors without their knowledge. The German-language checklist on the quality of open access journals provided by Brinken et al. (2021) can help authors to make informed decisions. Other criteria for the assessment of the trustworthiness of a journal are provided by the website Think. Check. Submit. It can also be helpful to ask colleagues whether they have ever heard of the journal in question. In case of suspicion, attention should definitely be drawn to the journal. By keeping their eyes open and being the properly aware, authors can avoid publishing with predatory publishers by mistake. The Monash Health Library has published the useful Predatory publishing A-Z elements . Further German-language information on predatory journals and predatory publishers can be found in an overview provided by Helmholtz Open Science and in a fact sheet published by the Science Media Center Germany . In addition, there is a catalogue of criteria for recognising high-quality journals and so-called fake journals. References AG Universitätsverlage. (2018, September 11). Qualitätsstandards für Open-Access-Monografien und -Sammelbände . https://ag-univerlage.de/?p=1974 Brehm, E. (2021). Zweitveröffentlichungsrecht für Wissenschaftler*innen. https://doi.org/10.5446/51789 Brinken, H., Rücknagel, J., & Wenninger, A. (2021). Checkliste zur Qualität von Open-Access-Zeitschriften . Zenodo. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4643853 Dreher, L. (2020, August 27) . Open-Access-Vorgaben in EU-Projekten . OpenAccessTalk. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4048489 Li, Y., Wu, C., Yan, E., & Li, K. (2018). Will open access increase journal CiteScores? An empirical investigation over multiple disciplines. PLOS ONE , 13 (8), e0201885. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0201885 Morrison, H. (2018, January 31). DOAJ APC information as of Jan 31, 2018. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Open Access Scholarship / Littérature Savante En Libre Accès . https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2018/02/06/doaj-apc-information-as-of-jan-31-2018/ Piwowar, H., Priem, J., Larivière, V., Alperin, J. P., Matthias, L., Norlander, B., Farley, A., West, J., & Haustein, S. (2018). The state of OA: A large-scale analysis of the prevalence and impact of Open Access articles. PeerJ , 6 , e4375. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.4375 Rücknagel, J. (2021, April 15). Fördererauflagen zu Open Access - was gilt es zu beachten? OpenAccessTalk. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4694320 Rücknagel, J., & Schmeja, S. (2021, January 28). Open access basics – How to publish and what to consider? OpenAccessTalk. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4530414 Swan, A. (2010). The Open Access citation advantage: Studies and results to date . https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/268516/ Further Reading Forschungszentrum Jülich, Zentralbibliothek (2022). Predatory Publishers. "Schwarze Schafe" im Wissenschaftsbetrieb. Checkliste. URL: https://www.fz-juelich.de/de/zb/open-science/predatory-publishers Reimer N., & Halbherr, V. (2021). Kriterienkatalog zur Erkennung von qualitativ hochwertigen Journals und von sogenannten Fake-Journals. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5031928 Schmitz, J., & Schmeja, S. (2019). Bericht zum Workshop "Was tun, wenn es passiert ist? Umgang mit Publikationen, die bei einem Predatory Journal eingereicht wurden." https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3553616 Solomon, D. J., & Björk, B.-C. (2012). A study of open access journals using article processing charges. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology , 63 (8), 1485–1495. https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.22673...

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