Employed journalists in the print media split ownership of copyright with their employer. As the work was created in 2000, the employed journalist owns the right to photocopy the written material and to include it in a book, and the employer owns all other rights, subject to any agreement to the contrary. Only the owner of the right to reproduce and publish (that is, the employer) may bring any action for copyright infringement if a substantial part of the work has been used in the article without permission.

However, the other journalist may have an obligation to attribute you as the writer of the paragraphs. Therefore, you may be in a position to take action for an infringement of your moral rights (for example, by asking for an apology or payment of compensation).

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Unless you had an agreement to the contrary, you will own the right to reproduce your articles (written both before and after 30 July 1998) in a book. Your rights may therefore have been infringed.

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When submitting written work on a speculative basis, it is advisable to include a covering letter to the publisher which outlines either the terms on which you are offering a licence to publish or explaining that the work is only submitted for consideration and that, if the publisher is interested, it should contact you to negotiate terms.

Generally, submitting material in this context does not result in assignment of copyright to the publisher, but is likely to give rise to an implied licence to the publisher to publish the material.

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This will depend on your agreement with the original publisher.

If you are in any doubt as to what rights you have granted, or what your agreement means, you should seek advice from MEAA or a lawyer in private practice.

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See the guides published by the Australian Society of Authors. There are also Writers Centres in most capital cities which may be able to assist you. http://www.asauthors.org

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Whether you can take any action depends on your contractual arrangement with the original publisher – in particular whether you have granted your publisher the right to license your work to third parties. If you have not done so, you may have a claim for copyright infringement against the current publisher and against the publisher which authorised the re-publication.

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