RE: "Hands Off! That Fact Is Mine"

The ISO codes controversy is an example of this.

RFC 3066bis incorporates the language codes, script codes and country codes,
and I am not sure that we have had a comprehensive enough statment of
royalty freeness from ISO.

Jeremy


> -----Original Message-----
> From: www-rdf-interest-request@w3.org
> [mailto:www-rdf-interest-request@w3.org]On Behalf Of Graham Klyne
> Sent: 08 March 2004 14:08
> To: RDF interest group
> Subject: "Hands Off! That Fact Is Mine"
>
>
>
> Eek!
>
> [[
> # "Hands Off! That Fact Is Mine"
> Wired News (03/03/04); Zetter, Kim
>
> The Database and Collections of Information Misappropriation Act,
> which is
> expected to be reviewed by the House Commerce Committee on March 4, is
> drawing controversy because its provisions essentially permit certain
> companies to own and license facts, making anyone who copies and
> redistributes those facts without authorization vulnerable to criminal
> prosecution, critics contend. The bill's major supporters are LexisNexis
> database owner Reed Elsevier, leading legal database publisher
> Westlaw, and
> the Software and Information Industry Association; opponents include the
> American Association of Libraries, Yahoo!, Google, Verizon,
> Charles Schwab,
> and Bloomberg. Public Knowledge's Art Brodsky says the bill would allow
> anyone to monopolize facts entered into a database or a collection of
> materials, in direct violation of the Copyright Act, which
> stipulates that
> ownership does not extend to information and ideas. Commercial database
> companies counter that if they cannot build databases because of theft,
> then the public will not be able to access the information.
> Opponents argue
> that the legislation would make facts available only to those who can
> afford them, adding that databases are already protected by copyright
> statutes and usage agreements. Keith Kupferschmid of the Software and
> Information Industry Association claims the bill would be inapplicable in
> cases such as researchers using facts taken from databases to compose
> academic papers. "The bill only applies where someone takes a substantial
> portion of the database and uses it in a way that causes
> commercial harm to
> the provider of the data," he explains. However, Joe Rubin of the U.S.
> Chamber of Commerce says the bill places no restrictions on the amount of
> information a person has to take from the database to break the law.
> Click Here to View Full Article:
> http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,62500,00.html
> ]]
> -- http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2004-6/0305f.html#item9
>
> #g
>
>
> ------------
> Graham Klyne
> For email:
> http://www.ninebynine.org/#Contact
>
>

Received on Monday, 8 March 2004 08:23:44 UTC