Copyright and permissions

[Una Smith <una@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Mark Purnell <map2@leicester.ac.uk> writes:

>Thanks for the tips.  The reason I contacted Elsevier was to ask for 
>permission to publish (the usual courtesy), and they have since (after 
>a couple of days thinking about it) granted it.

That's more like it!

I did not mean to suggest taking any sort of legal action against
a publisher, or anything else that might endanger your relationship
with them.  But I agree with Jere that it's important to be careful
and that includes being well informed about standard practices and
their legal basis.  I can recommend _The Copyright Handbook:  How to
protect and use written works_, by Steven Fishman, 2nd edition 1994,
published by Nolo Press in Berkeley California, which covers a lot
of this in detail.  In particular, it explains a lot of the behind-
the scenes work that publishers of serials (should) do on behalf of
their authors.

	Una Smith			una.smith@yale.edu

Department of Biology, Yale University, New Haven, CT  06520-8104