Volume 2, No 3, 2005
Contractual Solutions in Electronic Publishing Industry: A Comparative study of License Agreements
B. M. Meera and K.T. Anuradha
Abstract
Information Technology (IT) revolution has brought global change and has impact on electronic publishing industry also. In the digital and networked environment, publishers are concerned about protecting their products from illegal use. Copyright has been proclaimed as an important weapon by the publishers to safeguard their products. In view of the increasing importance that is gained by contract law in electronic publishing, more and more libraries are engaged in signing License Agreements for getting access to all types of electronic information products. It has become imperative on the part of librarians to have knowledge of License agreements and their clauses. The body of the license agreements differs from publisher to publisher and is product dependent too. Since there is a difference between the license agreements of societal publishers and commercial publishers, an attempt is made here to carry out a comparative study of the clauses of the license agreements among commercial publishers at the first level and societal publishers at the second level. It is observed that the licensors' rights are well protected compared to that of licensees' rights.
Pages: 1-11
Keywords: Intellectual Property Rights, Copyright, License Agreements, Databases