Legal information


Staff and researcher of University of Luxembourg? Familiarise yourself with your legal rights.

 

What are my rights? 

In order to submit publications for Open Access on ORBilu, the author must have the necessary permissions.  

Luxembourg law 

Open Access is defined in the Berlin Declaration as meaning that research publications can be accessed, read, and re-used for free by any person with access to the internet, the only restriction being that the work is properly attributed to its author.

The promotion of the Open Access is fulfilling the ambitions of the Luxembourg Government as described in the Accord de coalition 2018-2023: « Une circulation accrue des connaissances scientifiques par « le libre accès » aux données scientifiques et aux publications résultant de la recherche financée par les moyens publics permettra de maximiser l’exploitation des résultats scientifiques. »

Copyright transfer 

The author who has not transferred their copyright for electronic distribution to the publisher can deposit his publication in open access (unless the agreement with the publisher was renegotiated later).  

  • This is, in principle, the case for all publications published before 1993. 
  • This is the case for publications published under a free license such as Creative Commons. 
Open access submission authorisation 

Does the publisher of the work authorise the submission to an institutional database? To find out, you can consult the publisher's website (or contact them directly) or SHERPA/RoMEO, which lists editorial policies, especially for self-archiving.  

What are my obligations? 

Some institutions, research programs and funding agencies make it compulsory to submit in OA the publications resulting from the research that concerns them. This is also the case at the University of Luxembourg with the mandate. 

The Univesity of Luxembourg mandate 

In 2012, the University of Luxembourg Executive Team decided to make deposit in ORBilu mandatory. 

The University of Luxembourg requires all University members to: 

  1. Deposit full-text electronic copies of all their peer-reviewed journal articles as well as papers from published conference proceedings in the University's digital repository immediately upon acceptance for publication (maximum delay: 1 month). This requirement applies to any articles and/or papers published since 1 January 2009; 
  2. Deposit the bibliographic references of all their scientific production published since 1 January 2009 in the University's digital repository. 

This obligation applies only to those publications made while employed at the University of Luxembourg. Therefore, if an author started on 1 Jan 2011, he/she is required to deposit everything published from 1 Jan 2011 onwards. 

The mandate goes on to describe the responsibilities of the primary author: 

  • It is the primary author's sole responsibility to deposit their works as well as to assign to them the appropriate level of accessibility (open access, open access with embargo, restricted access) in the University's digital repository. For restricted access deposits, the digital repository will permit the author to fulfil individual e-print requests. 

The primary author is also solely responsible for the quality of the data provided in the bibliographic reference. 

The mandate also states the University's wish to support the Open Access movement within the confines of copyright and publisher contracts as well as to clearly indicate that authors are free to publish where they best see fit:

The University of Luxembourg encourages all University members to: 

  1. Retain copyright ownership of published papers wherever possible; 
  2. Deposit all their publications and research outputs, regardless of the year of publication, such as books, book sections, reports, working papers, etc. in the digital repository; 
  3. Permit full open access to full-text copies via the digital repository as soon as publisher conditions allow. 

This deposit does not restrict in any way the choice of publisher or the means of publication. 

The mandate also includes a statement about how the Executive Team will make use of the publications in ORBilu. 

As of 1 January 2014, only publications referenced in said repository and deposited following the rules laid out above will be taken into consideration for: 

  • The official list of publications for the University's annual activity report; 
  • The official list of publications for the University's performance contract; 
  • Accompanying any curriculum vitae for all 'in-house' evaluation procedures (designations, promotions, grant applications, etc.). 

As mentioned in the paragraph above, one of the requirements for the promotions procedure is to have all publications which are to be taken into consideration in ORBilu. 

Based upon the references entered by University authors, the Executive Team is able to create an entire bibliography of the publications of its researchers and ease access to the full-text of recent publications. It will no longer be necessary to spend time at the end of each year to produce, and format, such lists. They can be generated simply and easily from ORBilu. 

Practically speaking, ORBilu  could be used to: 

  • Provide a bibliography; it builds lists based on the publications deposited. 
  • Consolidate existing data that is already publicly available with publications (ex: Web of Science citations, Scopus citations …). No new data is created. 

ORBilu does not define evaluation criteria nor compare disciplines. It does however provide statistics which show the visibility our authors are achieving. 

The Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) 

The FNR mandate makes the Open Access deposit of journal articles mandatory for all recipients of their funding.  LEARN + 

Plan S 

Plan S makes it mandatory, as of January 1, 2021, to publish and/or disseminate the full text of all scientific publication submissions funded by the Coalition S member, in Open Access and under an open license.  LEARN + 

Horizon 2020 

The H2020 mandate requires Open Access to peer-reviewed scientific publications addressing the results of Horizon 2020-funded research.  LEARN + 

Horizon Europe 

The Horizon Europe mandate requires Open Access to  peer-reviewed scientific publications – including books and other extended forms of publication – where these comprise the results of research that were carried out thanks to funding from the Horizon Europe project. LEARN + 

Contact Us: 
  • If you need specific legal information (e.g. when signing a contract with the publisher). 
  • If you encounter a legal problem. The Institution is committed to helping members of the community who encounter problems following submission, in good faith, of a work in ORBilu  (for example, modification of editorial policy regarding self-archiving). 

Also check the legal guide: THYS, L. (2009). "Legal aspects of scientific publishing: a practical guide for members of the academic community." 

What can readers of the site do? 

Users of the directory may read, download, copy, distribute and print any piece of work as long as they respect the basic rights of the authors of the University of Luxembourg. Also, Open Access to a full text on ORBilu  is subject to the acceptance of a user license under which users agree to: 

  • Indicate, in any citation, the source of the work and the name(s) of the author(s). 
  • Not to modify, transform or adapt the work, without the explicit authorisation of the author. 
  • Not to use the work for commercial purposes (i.e. with the primary intention or purpose of obtaining commercial advantage or financial compensation). 
  • Not to use the work in such a way as to interfere with its exploitation in other forms. 

You can access the complete license agreement. 

 
Which licenses for files uploaded to ORBilu? 

For any document available in Open Access on ORBilu, the author must sign the submission application in order to authorise the electronic diffusion of their publication. 

If several authors are involved, they will all have to sign the license in order for the reference to be made available on Open Access. The license will be sent to them via the email address indicated by the submitter for each co-author. 

Creative Commons licences 

These licenses used in Gold Open Access publication allow to define permitted uses for the readers. If a publication is under a free license, it can be indicated as such on ORBilu  and distributed under the same license. 

See the different types of CC licenses on creativecommons.org 

 

We take care to respect the rights of each participant as much as possible. If you feel you have been wronged, please inform the ORBilu team and we will immediately restrict access to the disputed document while we investigate the case.  

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