Electronic Mandatory Deposit Terms and Requirements
What is the electronic Copyright Office (eCO)?
eCO refers to the electronic Copyright Office website. It is a system specially designed to expedite the process of registering a work for copyright, and for submitting electronic deposits for registration and mandatory deposit.
Under the mandatory deposit provision of copyright law (17 U.S.C. section 407), the owner of copyright or the exclusive right of publication in a work published in the United States must deposit within three months of publication the required number of copies of the best edition of the work with the U.S. Copyright Office for the use of the Library of Congress. For details, see Circular 7d, Mandatory Deposit of Copies or Phonorecords for the Library of Congress, and section 202.19 of the Code of Federal Regulations.
Does mandatory deposit apply to publications published only online?
Effective February 24, 2010, the Copyright Office adopted an interim regulation governing mandatory deposit of online serials published in the United States and available only online. The regulation establishes that online-only works are exempt from mandatory deposit until the Copyright Office issues a demand for deposit of such works. Demands will be made only for works published on or after February 24, 2010. Publishers may also submit back issues.
For mandatory deposit purposes, the Service Request, or SR number refers to a unique identifier assigned by the Copyright Office to a serial demanded under the mandatory deposit requirement of copyright law. The SR number is located on the upper right-hand corner of your Notice for Mandatory Deposit.
What is metadata? Why do I need to provide it?
For the purpose of depositing online works, metadata is information describing the data content of a submission. Such data helps classify, aggregate, and identify the file structure of the submission. Some examples of bibliographic metadata to include with a deposit submission include title, publication pattern, and International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) or publication enumeration.
What is a presentation style sheet? Do I have to include one with my deposit submission?
External style sheets help separate the presentation of a webpage from its content. Style sheets use language such as CSS or VSL to define the visual layout of the page. A style sheet is required for non-NLM DTD XML and/or HTML. You should provide a presentation style sheet with your submission if one is needed to properly display your content as published.
What is a TOC? Do I have to include it with my deposit submission?
If a serial issue includes a table of contents (TOC) that lists all the articles and other content included in the work, it helps the Copyright Office verify whether a complete copy of the work has been received. If a work does not include a TOC, the Copyright Office does not require that one be created for submission of a deposit.
What is a manifest? Do I have to include one with my deposit submission?
A manifest is an inventory of the files included in a deposit submission. It is used to define extension- and package-related data and permits the Copyright Office to verify receipt of all the files associated with a deposit.
For deposits sent to the Copyright Office via our web interface, a manifest is highly recommended as it provides a way to check that all uploadedfiles have been received. For deposits sent via FTP (system to system push), files are typically bundled into logical units, such as volumes and issues, and compressed into single files (*zip, *tar.gz). A transmission manifest listing all the compressed files included in the transfer is REQUIRED.