RE: [External] Re: UCUM licensing [was Re: Blank nodes must DIE! ]

I have suggested that UCUM replace the non-standard license with CC BY-ND, also with explicit clarification on the BY obligation and ND prohibition – see https://ucum.org/trac/ticket/5778 .
If anyone on this thread thinks that would still be problematic, then please speak up urgently!

From: Cox, Simon (L&W, Clayton) <Simon.Cox@csiro.au>
Sent: Thursday, 28 January, 2021 18:43
To: phayes@ihmc.us
Cc: Abhyankar, Swapna <sabhyank@regenstrief.org>; "“semantic-web@w3.org”" <semantic-web@w3.org>; David Booth <david@dbooth.org>; Maxime Lefrançois <maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr>
Subject: [ExternalEmail] RE: [External] Re: UCUM licensing [was Re: Blank nodes must DIE! ]

Indeed Pat, I agree, and actually the people behind UCUM do as well (I’ve asked them). But plenty of people in our community have found the wording in the ‘Terms of Use’ sufficiently fierce, and non-standard that they prefer to just walk away. Which is bad for UCUM and bad for the rest of us.

I’ve put this high up on the agenda in the UCUM advisory board.

From: phayes@ihmc.us<mailto:phayes@ihmc.us> <phayes@ihmc.us<mailto:phayes@ihmc.us>>
Sent: Friday, 15 January, 2021 10:56
To: Cox, Simon (L&W, Clayton) <Simon.Cox@csiro.au<mailto:Simon.Cox@csiro.au>>
Cc: Abhyankar, Swapna <sabhyank@regenstrief.org<mailto:sabhyank@regenstrief.org>>; "“semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>”" <semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>>; David Booth <david@dbooth.org<mailto:david@dbooth.org>>; Maxime Lefrançois <maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr<mailto:maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr>>
Subject: Re: [External] Re: UCUM licensing [was Re: Blank nodes must DIE! ]



On Jan 14, 2021, at 1:10 PM, Cox, Simon (L&W, Clayton) <Simon.Cox@csiro.au<mailto:Simon.Cox@csiro.au>> wrote:

Just found this draft that I should have sent 4 months ago.
-----------

Thanks Swapna –

Looking at https://ucum.org/trac/wiki/TermsOfUse I see the following issues:

Clause 1)
“… users shall not use any of the Licensed Materials for the purpose of developing or promulgating a different standard for identifying units of measure …”

It has been proposed to use UCUM codes in the context of RDF data to indicate the scale for quantity data. The exact arrangement has not been decided. But it is expected that it will be necessary to use web-links for individual units-of-measure, which will include the UCUM code as an element or an argument. Dereferencing these should get a , and that these should

QUDT (http://qudt.org/) is a different standard, designed with an RDF/OWL/SHACL representation. Every unit-of-measure in the QUDT vocabulary is ‘identified’ using a URI. There is an (optional) field in QUDT to add the UCUM code as an ‘annotation’ on an individual description, to support cross-matching or to enable discovery using the UCUM code. But the use of UCUM codes in the context of QUDT appears to violate this provision.

Surely that turns on what constitutes "use" of the licensed materials. I could argue a case in court that placing a hyperlink in an annotation, for the sole purpose of facilitating access to the licenced materials, does not constitute use. In fact I believe this very matter recently came before a European court and was decided in the rational way. Sorry I do not have the links handy.

Pat Hayes



Simon



From: Abhyankar, Swapna <sabhyank@regenstrief.org<mailto:sabhyank@regenstrief.org>>
Sent: Friday, 4 September, 2020 01:15
To: “semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>” <semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>>
Cc: David Booth <david@dbooth.org<mailto:david@dbooth.org>>; Maxime Lefrançois <maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr<mailto:maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr>>
Subject: Re: [External] Re: UCUM licensing [was Re: Blank nodes must DIE! ]

Hi everyone,

Can someone please summarize the issues related to the UCUM terms of use? We are in the process of updating the terms, so your timing is perfect, but the bottom line is that when the codes are used in conjunction with clinical data, no copyright notice will be required.

Thank you!
-Swapna

----------------------------------------------------
Swapna Abhyankar, MD
Interim Director
LOINC and Health Data Standards
<image001.png>
1101 West Tenth Street
Indianapolis, IN  46202

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From: Maxime Lefrançois <maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr<mailto:maxime.lefrancois@emse.fr>>
Date: Thursday, September 3, 2020 at 10:22 AM
To: David Booth <david@dbooth.org<mailto:david@dbooth.org>>
Cc: "“semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>”" <semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>>, "Abhyankar, Swapna" <sabhyank@regenstrief.org<mailto:sabhyank@regenstrief.org>>
Subject: [External] Re: UCUM licensing [was Re: Blank nodes must DIE! ]

This message was sent from a non-IU address. Please exercise caution when clicking links or opening attachments from external sources.

Dear all,

I am very happy to see that things are moving in the right direction with UCUM! Thanks a lot!

I am looking forward to resuming the work on cdt:ucum, and would be excited to see it usable in triplestores.

Best regards,
Maxime Lefrançois
MINES Saint-Étienne
http://maxime-lefrancois.info/



Le jeu. 3 sept. 2020 à 16:15, David Booth <david@dbooth.org<mailto:david@dbooth.org>> a écrit :
FYI, Swapna Abhyankar from Regenstrief (copied) is working on updating
the UCUM license, and reached out to me to understand the concerns that
have been raised on this list.  I suggested that he join this
discussion, to directly understand all concerns.

David Booth

On 9/3/20 5:43 AM, Antoine Zimmermann wrote:
> Indeed, Dave. The datatype discussed in this thread is the one
> colloquially identified as cdt:ucum, which stands for:
>
> http://w3id.org/lindt/custom_datatypes#ucum

>
> This URI dereferences to a documentation which is currently in
> disagreement with the Copyright Notice and License of UCUM since it does
> not include the said notice.
>
> The documentation is a draft, subject to evolve, and is not currently
> officially endorsed by any organisation, although we know people other
> than us who are using it in their projects.
>
> The URI contains the term "custom_datatype" because it is one of several
> custom datatypes that we are defining for various purposes. It was not
> initially planned to separate cdt:ucum from our other custom datatypes,
> but if their is a community willing to push this work towards
> standardisation, we should give a second thought to the namespace of the
> URI.
>
> We should also, obviously, update the documentation to make the
> Copyright Notice appear explicitly.
>
> However, I doubt that the copyright notice can legally enforce anyone to
> include the notice if they are merely using the codes in data about
> measurements or physical quantities. So, as far as I'm concerned, I will
> continue to use these codes and the cdt:ucum datatype whenever relevant
> in my projects or publications, as well as encourage others to do so.
>
>
> --AZ
>
>
>
> Le 03/09/2020 à 10:14, Dave Reynolds a écrit :
>> On 03/09/2020 09:04, Cox, Simon (L&W, Clayton) wrote:
>>>
>>>   * That just allows exchange of any /measurements/
>>>
>>> This is the RDF application that we were discussing in this thread, I
>>> think – where the UCUM code only appears in the context of a
>>> measurement instance (i.e. a quantity) either embedded in the literal
>>> else appearing in a data-type.
>>>
>>
>> If appearing as a data-type that would be a URI surely? And, if a URI,
>> given this is on the semantic-web list, wouldn't that URI resolve to
>> something? That something would be explicitly or implicitly
>> communicating partial information from UCUM. It's whoever puts up
>> those data type URIs that needs to find a way through the "prickly"
>> license.
>>
>> Dave
>>
>>> I can see your point that QUDT may be violating the strict
>>> interpretation, so will attempt to clear that up separately. But I
>>> still content that the use-case canvassed in this thread is OK.
>>>
>>> *From:*Dave Reynolds <dave.reynolds@epimorphics.com<mailto:dave.reynolds@epimorphics.com>>
>>> *Sent:* Thursday, 3 September, 2020 17:49
>>> *To:* semantic-web@w3.org<mailto:semantic-web@w3.org>
>>> *Subject:* Re: Blank nodes must DIE! [ was Re: Blank nodes semantics
>>> - existential variables?]
>>>
>>> On 03/09/2020 03:43, Cox, Simon (L&W, Clayton) wrote:
>>>
>>>     Dan Brickley wrote (a while back):
>>>
>>>     ØOn Thu, 23 Jul 2020 at 19:50, Patrick J Hayes <phayes@ihmc.us<mailto:phayes@ihmc.us>
>>>
>>> <mailto:phayes@ihmc.us<mailto:phayes@ihmc.us>?Subject=Re%3A%20Blank%20nodes%20must%20DIE!%20%5B%20was%20Re%3A%20Blank%20nodes%20semantics%20-%20%20existential%20variables%3F%5D&In-Reply-To=%3CCAFfrAFqgq7JxxwzEhYoMV70haRznXkjLBiOwhQUjwGJ0S0vsug%40mail.gmail.com<http://40mail.gmail.com/>%3E&References=%3CCAFfrAFqgq7JxxwzEhYoMV70haRznXkjLBiOwhQUjwGJ0S0vsug%40mail.gmail.com<http://40mail.gmail.com/>%3E>>
>>>
>>>     wrote:
>>>
>>>     Ø
>>>
>>>     Ø> Excellent. I have thought for some time that this way of using
>>>     datatyping
>>>
>>>     Ø> would be the right way to go. Congratulations on having
>>>     actually done it :-)
>>>
>>>     Ø>
>>>
>>>     Ø
>>>
>>>     ØThis is really interesting. Every couple of years I stumble
>>>     across UCUM (
>>>
>>>     Øhttp://unitsofmeasure.org/trac ->
>>>
>>>     Øhttp://unitsofmeasure.org/trac/wiki/TermsOfUse) before being
>>>     scared away by
>>>
>>>     Øthe prickly terms of use document. It is not a document that
>>> seems to
>>>
>>>     Øwelcome re-use.
>>>
>>>     Ø
>>>
>>>     ØDan
>>>
>>>     I’ve attempted to clarify this with Gunther Schadow, but can’t get
>>>     a response.
>>>
>>>     Meanwhile, I was pointed to this service which does quantity
>>>     conversions based on UCUM codes:
>>>
>>>       * Form UI - https://ucum.nlm.nih.gov/ucum-lhc/demo.html

>>>       * API - https://ucum.nlm.nih.gov/ucum-service.html

>>>
>>>     FWIW QUDT now has basic UCUM support as well -
>>>
>>> https://github.com/qudt/qudt-public-repo/blob/master/schema/SCHEMA_QUDT-v2.1.ttl#L2924

>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>     I peered into the UCUM Terms of Use document and I believe this is
>>>     the relevant clause:
>>>
>>>       * 5) UCUM codes and other information from the UCUM table may be
>>>         used in electronic messages communicating measurements without
>>>         the need to include this Copyright Notice and License or a
>>>         reference thereto in the message (and without the need to
>>>         include all fields required by Section 7 hereof).
>>>
>>>     So I think we are in the clear to use UCUM codes in the manner
>>>     that has been discussed in this conversation.
>>>
>>> I disagree.
>>>
>>> That just allows exchange of any /measurements/, it doesn't allow use
>>> of UCUM codes within metadata. Any service which, for example,
>>> provided metadata on units of measures and included UCUM codes as
>>> part of that metadata would be in violation. Assuming it including
>>> non UCUM metadata then it would violate the "not add any new
>>> contents" element of clause 2. If you kept the UCUM codes separate
>>> and included /all/ the fields required then you might be able to
>>> claim that as the "master term dictionary" use allowed under clause 7
>>> but then would have to show how you were satisfying the notice
>>> requirement which has no such corresponding allowance for "electronic
>>> messages".
>>>
>>> I am not a lawyer and so what I say here carries no value. Perhaps
>>> the QUDT folks, if they are now using UCUM, have a documented legal
>>> opinion that suggests more flexible reuse is possible.
>>>
>>> Dave
>>>
>>>     *Simon J D Cox *
>>>
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>>>     <https://research.csiro.au/ei>
>>>
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>>>
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>>>
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