[talk-au] Adelaide out of copyright street directory

[BlueMM]

Luke Woolley <lswoolley at ...> writes: 
> 
> It seems to me that the "published edition" copyright only protects the layout
of the actual work, for example if someone scanned a published edition of some
kind from say 1976 then re-published it commercially, that would be a no-no. But
since this is only deriving the data from it and publishing the data in a
different format, it seems fine. If we can all agree that it is indeed safe to
do this, then it would a big step forward in terms of source data for OSM.
> 
> Since anything which was published before January 1, 1984 can supposedly be
used, I have a 1984 Melways, edition 15 which could be scanned and hosted for
use by Melbourne mappers which was published in September 1983. It could also be
taken one step further and be included as a background layer in Potlatch, like
the old maps of the UK are at the moment. 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 18/01/2009, at 10:16 PM, Cameron <osm-mailing-lists <at> justcameron.com>
wrote:
> 
> 
> My suggestion would be to seek some advice from someone who knows a bit more
about copyright in Australia before copying something. The staff at libraries
are usually trained to have some knowledge of it. I don't really know what a
"published edition" is.Google brought this up -
http://www.unimelb.edu.au/copyright/information/fastfind/publisheded.html~Cameron
> 2009/1/18 Liz <edodd at billiau.net>
> On Sun, 18 Jan 2009, Liz wrote:
> > > Do maps fall under "published editions" or "artistic works"? Cos that
> > > will make a 25 year difference...
> No, I'm not a lawyer (phew)
> we are certainly taking the view that a map is a collection of facts
> and certainly not an artistic work
> (although Steve did mention on legal-talk about one mapper's work of a Pommie
> town that should have been considered an artistic work)
> I've just scanned a 1979 Gregory's of Wollongong.
> Do I put it on my server?
> I once had a 1980 Adelaide directory but binned it years ago as it got me more
> lost than was helpful. There should be directories which are old enough in
> secondhand book shops.


I've been using http://www.nla.gov.au/copiesdirect/help/copyrightmap.html as the
basis for map copyright issues. It's from the National Library of Australia

Basically says:
* every map before 1955 is copyright free.
* 1955 and later
  * If Government created, 50 years after end of year of publication
     -> If dated 1960, it is free on 1 Jan 2011.
  * Non-Government, 70 years after end of year of publication
     -> If dated 1960, it is free on 1 Jan 2031.


Therefore, Melways 1st edition 1966, isn't free till 2037

BTW, some of the MMBW index maps have dates like 1977 hand written on them,
which means they aren't free till 2028!! The highest zoom maps I have seen are
very old, and are free of copyright (there might be 1955+ in there). Even worse,
if it isn't dated, it probably "unpublished" and the NLA site mentions it might
have perpetual copyright!!!

Also, Liz mentioned names & distances might not be copyright.
I believe this to be incorrect, as Australia (like Europe) seems to have
"Database" copyright. This was solidified in the "Sensis vs Someone?" about the
copyright of the Yellowpages. IIRK, this judgement confirmed database copyright,
and some companies had to change their business models!!!

I understand this is one of the main reasons that the UK guys created OSM. It
probably wouldn't of been born in the US, since they don't have any database
copyright.

PS. Yahoo! Mail is crap when emailing to this mailing list, lines don't get
wrapped & threading is broken (it starts a new thread for replies :-( ). Now
using through the Gmane.org system
(http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.gis.openstreetmap.region.au), much better so
far (even forces bottom-posting)...

Cheers,
BlueMM