Abstract: Sharing research data by depositing it in connection with a published article or otherwise making data publicly available sometimes raises intellectual property questions in the minds of depositing researchers, their employers, their funders, and other researchers who seek to reuse research data. In this context or in the drafting of data management plans, common questions are (1) what are the legal rights in data; (2) who has these rights; and (3) how does one with these rights use them to share data in a way that permits or encourages productive downstream uses? Leaving to the side privacy and national security laws that regulate sharing certain types of data, this Perspective explains how to work through the general intellectual property and contractual issues for all research data.

Citation: Carroll MW (2015) Sharing Research Data and Intellectual Property Law: A Primer. PLoS Biol 13(8): e1002235. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1002235.
Published: August 27, 2015, Copyright: © 2015 Michael W. Carroll. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) has launched a new Primer Series on information management technology issues with the publication of the first primer on the topic of RDM. The primer on Research Data Management provides an overview of how data management has changed in recent years, and outlines best practices for the collection, documentation, and preservation of research data. The importance of creating a data management plan (DMP) before beginning a research data project is emphasized. Crucial questions regarding how the data will be managed are answered ahead of time in a DMP, thus making it easier for the researcher to collect and document the data properly for future use and reuse. Creating research data that is easily reproducible and transparent is the ultimate goal, and following the guidelines in this primer can help educate researchers to ensure their data is available for others. The differences between publishing papers and publishing datasets and the citation challenges the data community are working on solving are also discussed.

Full text: Research Data management by Carly Strasser

Complete announcement:

Research Data Canada (RDC) in partnership with the international Consortia Advancing Standards in Research Administration Information (CASRAI) is pleased to announce the launch of a PILOT for a new interactive Glossary containing 500+ draft terms and definitions to support work in the field of research data management. The glossary is publicly available under a Creative Commons Attribution Only license (CC-BY) at http://dictionary.casrai.org/Category:Research_Data_Domain

The Glossary is meant to be a practical reference for individuals and working groups concerned with the improvement of research data management, and as a meeting place for further discussion and development of terms. Each term has a unique identifier and a URL that can be used as a tool to enhance reading comprehension of documents by hyperlinking terms to their definition. The aim is to create a stable and sustainably governed glossary of community accepted terms and definitions, and to keep it relevant by maintaining it as a ‘living document’ that is upd! ated when necessary. The URL for each term contains a link to a discussion page to complete the feedback loop with the community of users. The glossary is developed and maintained by RDC’s Standards & Interoperability Committee (RDC-SINC) in collaboration with CASRAI.

Walter Stewart, Coordinator
RDC