So far some specialists do not take publications on the Internet as seriously as printing works of full value. That is an ingrained stereotype, which does not have any legal grounds and is gradually passing away. Author's work (article) featured on the Web is considered to be a subject of copyright when it represents a work understood in the sense of Articles 5,6 and 7 of the RF Law On Copyright and Allied Rights. It is set forth in the Article 5 of the Law that copyright applies to the works, either published or non-published, but present in some object form in Russia or abroad. Article 6 states that "copyright applies to scientific papers, literary and art works, which are the result of creative activities notwithstanding of their purpose, virtue and style. Copyright applies both to published and non-published works existing in some object form…" It should be kept in mind that, first of all, "copyright does not apply to ideas, methods, concepts, principles, discoveries and facts" and, secondly, "copyright for some work is not connected with property right for some material object, through which such work is expressed." Article 7 provides incomplete list of works falling under definition of "copyright object". Literary works, which actually include on-line publications, are at the top of the list. In any case they do not have anything to do with the works indicated in Article 8 that are not considered as copyright objects (the list is quite comprehensive). Therefore, an on-line article is undoubtedly an object of copyright with all the ensuing consequences.

           Suggestions on citing of the publications published in our journal are based on the principles of academic citing stated in the paper written by Kate L. Turabian, A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, 5th ed. (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1987). General principle coincides with the principle of print publications citing. It is necessary to mention the author of the work, title, where, when and in what kind of edition it has been published. Specific character of web citing lies in place of the publication (name of the web page instead of a city or publishing house), its context (the works are constituent parts not of the printed collection of articles or a periodical, but rather a part of a relevant website or its section - in our case: on-line journal Nature of Russia, portal http://www.biodat.ru.