Intellectual property and copyright
Whenever you create something, you automatically receive certain intellectual property rights. Therefore, to enable others to reuse your work, you have to choose an appropriate licence.
Share and publish
No matter your field, we recommend that you share your research data. There are many ways you can achieve this. You can share data informally during a project (e.g. using emails or file sharing services); or you can share data formally at project end or at certain milestones via:
- Data repositories
- Data journals
- Supplementary material to publications.
Sharing and publishing data means that your peers will be able to discover your work more easily. Your data can be citable just like a publication, thanks to persistent identifiers. Moreover, you will enable others to replicate and validate your findings.
If you followed the previous steps carefully, sharing data will be easy. When depositing your data, you will need tidy files, in the right format and with appropriate documentation and metadata. If you haven’t done this in a structured way, odds are that gathering this information will be burdensome.
This is the stage where you have to consider what licence you want to apply to your data. This is essential, as picking the wrong licence might lead to your work being unusable.
In some cases you will not be allowed to share research data because of pre-existing terms and conditions or other legal obligations (e.g. concerns about national security, or commercial interests). If this is the case, this lifecycle step may not apply to your research.
It should be noted that publishing data is a complex undertaking, as it involves disciplinary norms, technical infrastructure, training and more – the Open Data Institute (ODI) released a report providing useful insights and recommendations for data publishers.
Licensing
Licensing enables others to reuse research data. A licence states clearly what people can do with your work, including whether citation is required and how derivative work can be shared.
Identifiers
Identifiers allow researchers to cite and be cited. They are persistent links to content and ensure an object is discoverable at all times, even if its location changes.
Linking your data to a publication
Research publications are most useful when supported by the underlying data. There are many pathways to share data with publications, including online repositories (disciplinary, generalist or institutional), regular journals and specialised data journals.
Where should I deposit my data?
Choosing where to deposit research data is a crucial matter. It highly affects its impact, reach and audience. Making the right choice leads to increased citations and data reuse.
RDM at your institution
Quick access to relevant RDM information and guidance provided by your institution.
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