Notice of Intent to Digitise
The Fortress Study Group (FSG) intends to start scanning and making available in electronic form the back numbers of FORT
The Fortress Study Group (FSG) intends to start scanning and making available in electronic form the back numbers of FORT - the international Journal of fortification and military architecture - and of our magazine Casemate. By giving convenient access to previously published papers, of which some members will not have copies, we expect this to be a significant enhancement of the benefits of membership.
At present FORT and Casemate authors assign copyright (for both print and electronic publication) to the FSG. This does not limit an author’s ability to reuse material, but ensures that the FSG can protect the copyright internationally. However papers which we published in the past, in our back numbers, were not controlled in this way, nor did we seek permission to obtain electronic rights because this form of publishing was not envisaged. The FSG does not have the wherewithal to identify all the authors of the past 30 years who have previously contributed to FORT or Casemate and obtain permission to republish their work electronically from them or from their estate executor where an author is deceased. Moreover we are very uncertain that the addresses that we had at the time of publication are still valid.
Therefore we are publishing this announcement to ask for any FORT or Casemate authors, from 1976 onwards, who object to the proposed policy, to inform us as soon as possible.
We will make a presumption of permission unless consent is withdrawn, in which instance we will reluctantly remove the relevant article from the digital archive. We feel that this will inescapably alter the balance of the particular journal to a certain extent, but we will respect the decision.
We anticipate that most people involved in the activities of the FSG will read this notice, and we would appreciate it if you could bring this to the attention of anyone you think relevant. We will be starting to scan soon, and want to ensure that notice of our intentions is widely circulated.