Sharing Journals & Copyright Concerns
Copyright Compliance
When uploading content to the university’s website, it’s important to follow copyright laws. Copyrighted materials, such as journal articles, cannot be uploaded without proper permission. Even though the university provides access to a vast collection of academic journals and publications through its subscription services, this does not mean that these materials can be freely redistributed or posted online for public access. This access is intended for personal use, research, and educational purposes, under certain terms and conditions agreed upon with the publishers.
Website editors must ensure that any content shared complies with copyright laws and licensing terms.
Why You Can’t Upload Copyrighted Journals
- Legal Violations: Distributing copyrighted content without permission is against U.S. copyright law and could result in legal consequences for both you and the university.
- Subscription Limitations: The university’s access to journals is restricted to authorized users. Posting these materials publicly bypasses those restrictions.
What You Can Do Instead
- Use Open Access Resources: If you’re looking to share academic articles, consider linking to open-access journals or publications, which are freely available without copyright restrictions.
- Link to the Resource: Instead of uploading the entire article, provide a link to the journal or article through the university’s library system. This ensures that only authorized users can access the content while respecting the publisher’s terms.
- Request Permission: If you need to share an article more widely, contact the publisher to request permission to distribute the material. Some publishers may allow it under certain conditions, such as for educational use within the university.
- Use Excerpts Within Fair Use: For educational or commentary purposes, consider using brief excerpts or summaries of the article, ensuring that it complies with fair use guidelines.
Open Access
Open-access journals, which are freely available for anyone to view, can be shared without copyright concerns. However, many of these PDFs and documents do not meet web accessibility standards.
Accessibility Issues
Web authors must ensure that any content hosted on a UNC website complies with accessibility guidelines. According to UNC’s Digital Accessibility Policy, all digital content—including PDFs and Word documents—must be fully accessible.
While open-access content can be shared freely, many open-access journal PDFs do not meet accessibility standards.
Rather than redistributing documents directly, we recommend citing and linking to the source. This approach ensures that users access the most current version of the publication and helps prevent accessibility issues associated with hosting non-compliant content.
Cite and Link to Journals
When referencing journal articles, provide a proper citation. This often includes the author’s name, article title, journal title, volume and issue numbers, year of publication, and a DOI or URL. The citation style you use (AMA, APA, MLA, or other citation style) will determine the format of the information. Include a link to the DOI if available, otherwise provide a URL to help readers locate the source.
Tip: most journal databases such as PubMed provide properly formatted citations that can be easily copied and pasted into your website. They often also provide the DOI url.
What is a DOI?
A DOI (Digital Object Identifier) is a unique and permanent link assigned to electronic sources. Unlike URLs, DOIs are static and provide a reliable way to locate sources even if they are moved. This would be the preferred link to use.
How to Verify a Journal’s Open Access Status
Adherence to legal and copyright regulations is essential when sharing published works to avoid infringement.
You may only post a journal article if:
- The creator(s) have dedicated it to the public domain, or
- It is available under an open access license or similar open distribution method.
Open access is a publishing model that allows free online access to journal articles, enabling any user to read and use these works legally.
Website editors must ensure that any content shared complies with copyright laws and licensing terms.
Verification Resources
- Consult Directories, Repositories and Databases: Use reputable sources like the PubMed to verify if the journal is listed as Open Access.
- Reference the Health Sciences Library for a wide variety of tools and resources.
- Find your journal in a database such as PubMed, PLOS ONE, BioMed Central, and PeerJ and look for the copyright license and permissions.
- Open Access Button is an excellent tool for checking the open access status of journal articles. On that website, enter the article’s title or DOI to check if it is freely available. This will find open access copies on publishers’ sites and in repositories.
- Unpaywall is another great source for this information. If you have many articles to check, use Unpaywall’s Simple Query Tool to enter a list of DOIs.
- Institutional Repositories:
- Check if journals affiliated with our university or other institutions allow for self-archiving and dissemination of research articles.
- Reference the Journal:
- Check for an open access or Creative Commons license on the article itself.
Example of an Open Access attribution on a publication.
- Check for an open access or Creative Commons license on the article itself.
- Check the Journal’s Website:
- Look for information on access policies, subscription details, and article availability.
Summary
To legally share published works on your website, respect copyright and licensing agreements, ensure proper citation, and link to the original sources. Following these guidelines will help you responsibly and legally share academic and journalistic content.
Getting Help
If you have specific questions about particular articles or need assistance with permissions, contact the Scholarly Communications Office at UNC Libraries. Their services provide copyright information and education to students, faculty, and staff through consultations, presentations, and classes.
Other Resources
- Copyright basics from UNC’s Health Sciences Library.
- Additional copyright tools and resources from the UNC Health Sciences Library.
- Scholarly Communications Office, UNC-CH Libraries – provides copyright information and education to students, faculty, and staff through consultations, presentations, and classes.
- Fair Use Analysis Worksheet from UNC Libraries – This worksheet poses targeted questions to help users evaluate whether their intended use of copyrighted material qualifies as fair use.
- Copyright and Fair Use Collection from UNC Libraries – This collection from UNC Libraries offers a curated set of resources on copyright and fair use, including tools, guides, and worksheets to support users in navigating complex copyright issues.
- How Can I Share It? is a website that provides links to many publishers’ policies on sharing and serves as a good resource to be consulted both before sharing and before signing copyright agreements prior to submitting manuscripts for publication. Policies governing a specific article can also be accessed by simply supplying the publication’s DOI (digital object identifier) if available. It is important to note that, even with permission, there may be restrictions on the version (preprint vs. postprint) and the format (PDF vs. Microsoft Word document) of the manuscript that can be shared, and possibly a requirement to include a link pointing back to the article at the “official” journal website. In short, not only is the process complex, policies are also constantly changing. It is also possible that an earlier copyright agreement be superseded as publisher policies evolve.
- Copyright Policy of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
- Understanding copyright for journal authors by Taylor and Francis.
- Fair Use Basics from the Columbia University Copyright Advisory Office – Explores the foundational principles of fair use in copyright law, including the four key factors used to assess whether a particular use qualifies as fair use.
- Fair Use Evaluator – This tool helps users determine whether their specific use of a copyrighted work might qualify as fair use under U.S. copyright law. It guides you through the evaluation process, generating a detailed record of your analysis for documentation purposes.
- Fair Use Checklist from The Ohio State University Health Sciences Library – This tool is designed to help users assess whether their intended use of copyrighted material aligns with the principles of fair use. This checklist offers a systematic way to document your analysis.