Hi, Stevan,
The APS has just revised its copyright form, and the one you pointed to
is in fact the new one.
The following statement, put together by our Editorial Director, Stanley
Brown, summarizes our rationale.
Marty Blume
Editor in Chief
American Physics Society
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In June 2000, APS released a new copyright-transfer agreement, giving
authors more freedom in the subsequent use of their articles published
in APS journals. Under the terms of the new agreement, authors are
free to grant permission to others to republish their articles (not of
course in other journals, but in, for example, collections of articles
on a specialized subject or by a particular author). Permission of APS
is needed only if the APS-formatted version (e.g., the actual printed
pages from the APS journal, or the PDF or HTML file from the online
journal) is used.
Under the previous version of the copyright-transfer agreement, the
permission of both APS and the authors was needed for any
republication. Under the new agreement, permission from either APS or
the authors is sufficient. APS and the authors can now each proceed
without reference to the other in granting permission.
APS decided to remove the requirement for joint agreement both to give
authors more freedom regarding subsequent uses of their work, and to
protect its own interests in possibly ambiguous situations in the
future. In producing its own print and online journals, APS currently
acts through two different composition houses and two different online
hosts. APS is confident that these arrangements with vendors acting on
its behalf do not constitute republication by third parties, and thus
do not, even under the old copyright agreement, require permission from
both APS and authors. However, it is possible to imagine more complex
arrangements in the future. To avoid having to consider whether such
arrangements could be interpreted as third-party "republication", APS
has modified the agreement to make it clear that all such arrangements
are within the scope of its rights as publisher, while also making it
clear that the authors have a similar freedom.
The American Institute of Physics is also modifying its copyright
agreements with authors. It is expected that the AIP and APS
agreements will be nearly identical with each other.
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Received on Mon Jan 24 2000 - 19:17:43 GMT