Keeping the user in the workflow: IR licensing for mediated deposits

Abstract

The practice of mediated deposit of content to Institutional Repositories (IRs) is widespread (e.g. CNI 2017, Dubinsky 2014, Poynder 2016, Salo 2008). For Cornell University’s DSpace installation, eCommons, approximately 80% deposits have been mediated. An IR deposit workflow typically involves presenting the uploader, presumed also to be the rights holder, with a license agreement granting the service provider the non-exclusive rights required to provide the service. Mediated deposit complicates the process of obtaining permission from the rights holder and removes them from the licensing process. In spite of this reality, IR platforms have yet to evolve to support this aspect of mediated deposit, even while they support batch upload (presumably mediated). Similarly, standard deposit agreements seldom address mediated deposit (Rinehart and Cunningham 2017). This leaves IR managers to either develop their own workarounds, or perhaps, simply omit the process of obtaining and documenting the rights holder’s acceptance of the repository license. We will share our procedures for obtaining, recording and retaining acceptance of the terms of our IR’s license for a variety of mediated deposit scenarios.