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Research Publications and Copyright Policy: Is it possible to opt out?

A guide intended to raise awareness, provide a straightforward explanation of what rights retention is and guide researchers through what they need to do to take advantage of the new policy.

Is it possible to opt out of the policy?

We recognise that there may be some cases where there is a valid reason to opt out of the policy, but be aware that if you opt out your output may not be compliant with your funder or the REF requirements.

Opting-out might be appropriate in scenarios where: 

  • An article contains a substantial amount of third-party material (such as images, photographs, diagrams, or maps) that cannot be shared with a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence and the removal of them would compromise the reading of the work.
  • An article contains sensitive material not appropriate for wider sharing.
  • Co-authors do not want to share the manuscript with a CC BY licence.
  • A journal will not allow you to comply with the rights retention policy.
  • You have already applied for a UKRI/Wellcome licensing exception.

If you want to opt out of the University’s policy, you are requested to indicate your intention by completing this form prior to the submission of your paper. Authors can also contact gro@gold.ac.uk if they are considering opting out. The Open Research team will monitor and analyse the reasons for opting out to:

  • help us improve our guidance on the Rights Retention process. 
  • feed into negotiations with publishers on aspects of Open Access publishing. 
  • enable us to provide more support to authors when the reasons for opting out are due to external factors (such as resistance from co-authors or publishers). 

Please note that if you opt out of this policy and/or the CC BY licence requirement, your output may not be compliant with your funders open access policy or the REF Open Access Policy. If opting out of the requirement for immediate open access upon publication, authors should inform their funder of potential non-compliance with their policy. Authors should also contact the Associate Head of RKE and REF Unit of Assessment Lead in their School, informing them of potential non-compliance with the REF Open Access Policy.

Outputs that have been opted-out of immediate open access should still be deposited to Goldsmiths Research Online (GRO).

You do not need to opt-out of the institutional policy if the final published version will be made openly available through:

In these instances, the accepted manuscript will not be made available, and the GRO record will direct users to the pdf of the final published version.

To discuss cases where it is not possible to comply with the policy, and for further help and advice, authors should contact gro@gold.ac.uk as soon as possible.

What if I want to use a different Creative Commons licence?

We recognise that for some papers, the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence may not be appropriate, and you may need to choose an alternative licence.

The alternative licences available are:

CC BY-SA (Share Alike): the work can be reused for all kinds of purposes, but any newly created work must also be shared under the same licence (e.g. you could not create a new work and then issue it under a more open or more restrictive licence).

CC BY-ND (No Derivatives): the work can be reused as is, without modification. This might be useful if the integrity of the original work is important.

CC BY-NC (Non-Commercial): all kinds of reuse are permitted as long as they are for non-commercial purposes.

If you wish to opt out of the CC BY licence requirement of the policy and choose a different Creative Commons licence, then you can do so by completing this form. Authors can also contact gro@gold.ac.uk to discuss cases where an alternative Creative Commons licence may be appropriate.

In the first instance, the Open Research team will review alternative licence choices and in most cases will approve the request. If assigning an alternative licence means there will be an issue with complying with funder open access requirements, the Open Research team will inform the Associate Head of RKE and REF Unit of Assessment Lead in the researchers School. 

Any third-party material in a paper can be included under a different licence, if required by the rights’ holder. For example, if the paper includes an image licensed with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial (CC-BY-NC) licence, the paper can be released under a CC-BY licence with the image licensed separately with a CC-BY-NC licence.  

This list gives examples of situations where an alternative licence may be required: 

  • The paper has a co-author whose employment precludes the use of a CC BY licence. 
  • The paper makes use of third-party material licensed under a Creative Commons licence with a Share-Alike clause. In this case the paper should be made available under that same licence so that the Share-Alike requirement is met. 
  • The researcher has requested and been granted permission to use a Creative Commons Attribution No Derivatives (CC BY-ND) licence, or other specified licence, by their funder.  
  • The copyright holder of third-party material objects to the use of their material in a paper that is licenced under the CC BY licence but does approve the use if an alternative Creative Commons licence is chosen.
  • The publisher objects to the use of a CC BY licence but not to the use of an alternative Creative Commons licence.

The use of All Rights Reserved rather than an open licence is considered opting out to the policy rather than registering an alternative licence. If you are considering reserving all rights, please contact gro@gold.ac.uk as soon as possible.