Washington DC— An ad hoc working group has created a new blog to share and discuss draft standard author rights language for library content licenses. This language is intended to be used by libraries and consortia as they negotiate contracts with content vendors in order to ensure that authors at these institutions retain consistent rights to make educational and scholarly uses of their own publications.

Interest in this model language was first expressed at a 2009 meeting regarding policy development for open-access repositories sponsored by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL). Subsequently, the ad hoc working group developed model language for use by those who license content for libraries.

The language consists of a license clause that retains rights for authors to use their own work and provides definitions for terms used in the clause. An article by Ivy Anderson providing background on the development of the language appears in ARL’s April 2010 Research Library Issues http://publications.arl.org/s68n7/12 .

At their meetings in April 2010, the ARL Reshaping Scholarly Communication Steering Committee supported the draft language and the ARL Board endorsed use of it by member libraries.

The blog contains the model language in a form that can be downloaded for use in existing content licenses. It also provides a place for comments about the license clause language and its use. Other sections of the blog list adopters and endorsers, as well as related efforts. The blog can be found at http://authorrights.wordpress.com/ .

The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) is a nonprofit organization of 126 research libraries in North America. Its mission is to influence the changing environment of scholarly communication and the public policies that affect research libraries and the diverse communities they serve. ARL pursues this mission by advancing the goals of its member research libraries, providing leadership in public and information policy to the scholarly and higher education communities, fostering the exchange of ideas and expertise, facilitating the emergence of new roles for research libraries, and shaping a future environment that leverages its interests with those of allied organizations. ARL is on the Web at http://www.arl.org/ .

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