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US flag Negotiating with publishers

Read the contract. It takes a while, but it is important. It's a legally enforceable set of words that are supposed to document your deal with the publisher. Does it faithfully do that? What is your deal? Can you describe it in plain English? Is there anything about it that seems to run counter to what you expect? What happens if they fail to publish within a year or so? Do you have the right to publicly archive your final refereed version? If it's a book, do the rights revert to you when the book goes out of print? Do they consider posting your early drafts on a website to be prior publication? Does anything bother you? Say so.

Things have moved on in publishing, there can be things in the contract that you really will regret later on. So read it!

OK, so you've found something you want to change: change it

It's that easy. You just score out what's there and you write what you want instead. You can use the margins if you're reviewing a paper copy, or you can use "track changes" in the word processor. If it's a PDF file, just print out a copy and mark it, digitize your markup and send it back by email.

So, what do you want in place of what's there? Just use plain English to say what you want. Publishers are really not that bad. At least give it a try.

Maybe you can get some help

Many universities give you help with publishing contracts because the rights preserved through negotiation, benefit the public generally, as explained in Managing your copyrights. At GCU, the Research Innovation and Enterprise Department (RIE) are there to help you.