The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) announces the
publication of a special themed issue of Information Standards Quarterly
(ISQ) on the topic of Licensing of Digital Content. Licensing of digital
content has been a complex-and contentious-issue since the advent of the
first e-journal. While much understanding and experience has been gained
since then, greater diversity in types of e-content and technology advances
continuously add new challenges to licensing. This issue of ISQ discusses
the current state of e-content licensing, standards and tools to aid in the
licensing process, and two projects aimed at improving rights management and
providing an alternative to standard licenses.
Ann Shumelda Okerson provides her Reflections on Library Licensing,
describing both the advancements that have occurred in digital content
licensing over the past decade and the remaining and new challenges that we
need to address.
David Martin authors a standard spotlight on the ONIX for Publication
Licenses specification from EDItEUR. While this standard has been around for
over five years, several recent developments may help make its adoption
finally take off.
The Linked Content Coalition is a relatively new project created by a global
consortium of standards bodies and registries. While not explicitly about
licensing, the identifiers and metadata related to usage rights that they
expound are critical to the ability for machines to manage, distribute, and
display rights and licensing information. Todd Carpenter discusses how the
group aims to make it possible to manage and access online rights
information seamlessly across all types of media.
NISO's Shared Electronic Resource Understanding (SERU) recommended practice,
presented as an alternative to a formal licensing negotiation, was updated
in 2012 to expand its use beyond e-journals. Adam Chesler and Anne McKee
review in SERU: Six Years and Still Going Strong, how this approach
continues to grow in use.
ISQ is available in open access in electronic format on the NISO website.
Both the entire issue on Open Access Infrastructure and the individual
articles may be freely downloaded. Print copies of ISQ are available by
subscription and as print on demand. For more information and to access the
free electronic version, visit: www.niso.org/publications/isq.
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