From the UN’s World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) recently released Contracts in Publishing: A Toolkit for Authors and Publishers:
Academic and scientific publishing is mainly concerned with the production and distribution of works of scholarly research through journals, non-fiction books and online resources. There are fast-moving and complex developments and debates in academic publishing around OA and openeducational resources (OERs). OA refers to materials that are freely available for anyone to use in their existing form; they may not be revised, repurposed or redistributed without the permission of the rights holder. OER refers to teaching, learning or research materials that are in the public domain where users are allowed to use as is, repurpose or tailor the materials according to their teaching or learning needs. The material can be shared or altered without permission or attribution.
It’s one of only two passing mentions of OA, and it’s plain wrong on repurposing and distribution (for most licenses); the contrast to OER (including the “public domain” statement) is equally weird. WIPO is the world’s IP broker, so it’s not surprising that OA gets short, inaccurate shrift. One irony: the toolkit carries a CC BY 4.0 license itself, so anyone may remix, transform, and build upon it for any purpose, as long as it’s attributed.