If your article makes use of any previously published material (including figures/diagrams, or short extracts, or content taken from websites) then you must first obtain the written permission of the copyright owner. The copyright owner is usually the publisher (for material taken from journal or proceedings articles), website owner/company (for material taken from websites) or the author or their employer (if the work is unpublished). Some publishers will also require that you seek the permission of the original author (you will need to check the terms of the publisher’s permission).
We ask you to submit written evidence:
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That all necessary permissions have been obtained by providing the actual written permission granted by the copyright owner, or
2
That permission is not required, e.g. where the material is available under one of the Creative Commons licences which allow commercial reuse and suits the purpose for which you want to reuse the content.
We do not obtain permissions on your behalf. It is your responsibility as the author of the article to ensure that all required permissions have been obtained in writing and any permission fee paid in full (if the copyright owner charges a fee for reuse).
IOP is a signatory to the STM Permissions Guidelines. This benefits you because if you are reusing content from another STM signatory publisher, you are usually allowed to use up to three figures in another article published by an STM signatory publisher free of charge (provided you are not adapting/changing the figure). If the STM signatory publisher has ticked the second column ‘Notification required’ in the list of signatory publishers then you must still obtain permission but you should receive the permission for free. For more information, please see the STM Permissions Guidelines page.
Please refer to this page for a useful guide on how to obtain permission.
The article will be protected by copyright and is generally only available to subscribers of the journal. There is generally no fee for publication on this basis, although some of our journals charge article page charges.
For most IOP Publishing (IOP) hybrid journals (journals which offer the choice of publishing on a subscription basis or on a gold open access basis), we generally require you to transfer (assign) the copyright in your subscription article to IOP (or to the relevant publishing partner) before acceptance of the article. For articles published on a gold open access basis, we generally only require that IOP is granted a non-exclusive licence. Please ensure you check the terms of the specific journal’s copyright form, as this does vary in some journals.
For most IOP fully gold open access journals (journals which only offer publication on a gold open access basis), we generally require you to grant a non-exclusive licence of the copyright in your article to IOP (or the relevant publishing partner) before acceptance of the article. However, please ensure you check the terms of the specific journal’s copyright form, as this does vary in some journals.
Following submission of your revised article, we will ask you to submit electronically the journal’s copyright form via the Author Centre. IOP cannot formally accept your article for publication until your fully signed copyright form has been received, along with any required permissions (see next section).
The transfer or licence of copyright in your article only takes effect from the date on which the article is accepted for publication. If you withdraw your article, or if it is not accepted, the transfer or licence does not take effect.
The main features of the copyright form are that:
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Authors transfer the worldwide copyright in the subscription-only article to IOP (or our publishing partner) in all formats and media (note that this applies to most of our hybrid journals).
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Authors grant a worldwide non-exclusive licence of the copyright in the gold open access article to IOP (or our publishing partner) in all formats and media.
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Authors assert their moral right to be identified as the authors of the article.
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For subscription-only articles, IOP grants back to authors certain rights; for details please see our Author Rights Policy.
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IOP currently publishes gold open access articles under the CC-BY licence.
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Provision is made for situations where copyright is not owned by the authors, for example an author’s employer, US government employees or Crown copyright.
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Provision is made for multi-author articles, in that only one author should submit the copyright form but they should have obtained the verbal agreement of all the other authors (and any other copyright owner) beforehand to its terms and submission of the form.
As well as addressing matters of copyright, the copyright forms contain assertions that:
- The article is the original work of the authors.
- The article has not been published previously and is not currently under consideration for another journal.
- Each of the authors has made a material contribution to the article.
- All authors have received the final version of the article and have agreed to it being submitted.
- The content of the paper is not defamatory, fabricated or an infringement of third-party rights.
- All required permissions have been obtained in writing.
For more details on the copyright form and how to complete it, please email permissions@ioppublishing.org.
The most important consideration is that the licence type, licence terms, attribution and details of the source material are clearly communicated to the reader. The specific attribution requirements vary by licence, therefore you will need to check the particular Creative Commons licence for full instructions.
Best practice when citing material published under a Creative Commons licence is to cite the author(s), the title of the work, the type of licence and the copyright owner. A link back to the source work and also a link to the licence should also be provided.
Your revised article and response to the referees will normally be sent back to one or more of the referees (minor revisions may be checked by our in-house staff). At this point, the referee(s) may recommend acceptance of your paper, or request further revisions. If the referee(s) are not satisfied with the changes made or are unable to report on the revised manuscript, we may consult an Editorial Board Member. (Occasionally, if the referee(s) and Editorial Board are not satisfied with the changes made to a manuscript, it may still be rejected at this stage.) Once your article is deemed to be acceptable for publication, you will receive a ‘provisional acceptance’ letter. This will be followed by a ‘formal acceptance’ letter when we have received from you everything we need to proceed with publication of your article (including your source files, completed copyright form and any permissions if necessary).
