This week (October 20-26, 2014) is Open Access Week, an annual global event promoting open access as a new norm in scholarship and research. Here at the Graduate Center, we’re celebrating Open Access Week with a workshop about understanding and preserving your rights as an author and an invitation to watch The Internet’s Own Boy, a documentary about information activist Aaron Swartz, at BMCC.  More information below…

 

You Know What You Write, But Do You Know Your Rights?

Understanding and Protecting Your Rights As an Author

Tuesday, October 21st, 1-2pm

Graduate Center Library, Room C196.05 (concourse level inside library)

 

When you publish a journal article, you sign a copyright agreement. Do you know what you’re agreeing to when you sign it? Different journals have different policies: Some journals require you to relinquish your copyright. (You then have to ask permission or even pay to share your article with students and colleagues!) Some journals allow you to retain some rights (e.g., the right to post online). Some journals leave copyright in your hands. (You simply give the journal a non-exclusive license to publish the article.) How can you find out a journal’s policy? How can you negotiate your contract to make the most of your rights as a scholar, researcher, and author?

 

Come learn how to preserve your rights to reproduce, distribute, and display the work you create. Led by Jill Cirasella, Associate Librarian for Public Services and Scholarly Communication at the Graduate Center. Open to students, faculty, staff, and anyone from the CUNY community who has questions about their rights as authors, open access publishing, or scholarly communication.

 

RSVP here: https://gclibrary.commons.gc.cuny.edu/event/intro-authors-rights-1pm/

Can’t make it? Want a preview of what’s covered? See the materials from the previous authors’ rights event.

 

 

The Internet’s Own Boy

Friday, October 24, 3-5pm

Borough of Manhattan Community College, Rm N780

Snacks will be served. RSVP not required.

Brought to you by the LACUNY Scholarly Communications Roundtable

 

Watch the trailer: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/internetsownboy/94238859

 

This documentary examines the life and contribution of internet and information activist Aaron Swartz. Swartz penned the Guerrilla Open Access Manifesto in 2008, two years after he freed the Library of Congress’s bibliographic data by posting it on OpenLibrary (LoC charges for access to this data) and the same year he liberated public court documents from expensive fee-based access through PACER (there are now Chrome and Firefox plugins called RECAP that provide a means for free downloading from the database). Come honor the life of Swartz and discuss ways that his work might be built upon and continued by those of us in the library and higher education communities.

 

For more information, please contact the co-chairs of the LACUNY Scholarly Communications Roundtable: Jean Amaral (jamaral@bmcc.cuny.edu) and Karen Okamoto (kokamoto@jjay.cuny.edu).