This page contains the current SCTPLS policy on copyrights, permissions, and options for open-access delivery. We apologize in advance for the complexity of the situation, which we did not invent.
All authors are required to sign and return an agreement to publish their article in NDPLS upon acceptance of the article for publication by the Editor in Chief. This contract is standard under U. S. law and publication industry norms. It cedes to SCTPLS exclusive rights to publish the article in NDPLS and to make agreements with other publishers to disseminate the material as widely as reasonably possible. The agreement cedes back to authors certain rights for re-use of their own material. The signature sections of the standard contract contain two provisions (a) all authors except (b) statutory employees of the United States Government. In the case of (b), United States Copyright law permits the U. S. Government to distribute copies of the material for any purpose of the government including unrestricted access by other parties to use and re-use the material so long as proper credit is accorded to the original authors and publication source. A sample contract is available here.
Authors are allowed to reprint portions of their own NDPLS articles in non-commercial venues such as other academic journal articles without charge. These portions may involve sections of text, figures or tables, so long as those materials were the author's original material and not material for which permission from another source was required. No formal permission request is required.
Authors who wish to reprint portions of their own NDPLS articles in other venues or wishing to reprint an article in its entirety must request permission. A nominal fee may be required. Please consult the fair use policy for further details on allowable uses of authors' PDF files. We made a point to be generous with reproduction for students and personal research colleagues.
NDPLS is a subscription-based journal, not an open-source journal. We do not charge authors fees to publish in NDPLS, which is common for open-source journals. We offer two types of arrangements:
A. Authors of articles that are based on research supported by the (U.S.) National Institutes of Health can expect that PubMed will process the article for inclusion on its data base. Authors may then use the material as defined in PubMed policies, which does not include commercial reproduction by other publishers. So long as the article in question contains an acknowledgment to an NIH funding source, no additional publication agreements are necessary beyond the standard agreement.
B. Authors who are not NIH contractors as defined above and who wish to acquire open-source republication rights may do so, however, by contacting our Permissions Editor (see below) after the article is accepted for publication and the copyright transfer form has been received. A fee and rider to the publication contract will be required. Under this rider agreement SCTPLS will make the article available without additional permissions or credentials, although SCTPLS will require that further uses of the materials will contain reference to the original source. Authors, in addition, may include their article on sites of their choice that facilitate full-text download of articles, including but not limited to, ResearchGate and web sites that feature the public distribution of a particular university's scholars' material anonymously to the outside world.
Persons who wish to reprint NDPLS articles or portions thereof and who are not the author of the material in question or are not selecting material from open source facilities, as defined in "2" above, must request permission; see below. A nominal fee will be required.
The verb "to reprint" in the foregoing conditions includes standard means of print and electronic publication in any format, including depositories or web sites not exempted in the conditions above. The foregoing conditions apply to all distribution quantities and to recipients beyond those allowed by the Fair Use clauses of the U. S. Copyright code.
By post: Send two copies of a written letter of request by post to one of the addresses below along with a return envelope. One copy will be returned to you with permission if granted, or other explanation will be provided. Letters of request should include a description of the material that will be reprinted (article citation and whether this is a request to reprint an entire article, or figure or table, or quote of 99 words or more) and a description of the new work for which it is intended (academic journal article, trade journal item, book, commercial promotion). Contact Dr. David Pincus, SCTPLS Permissions Editor, P. O. Box 484, Pewaukee, WI 53072 USA.
By E-mail: The same information as you would send by post can be sent by e-mail to Dr. David Pincus, SCTPLS Permissions Editor at register@societyforchaostheory.org