Talk:Data/Council Copyright Notices
From Open NZ Wiki
Horizon's statement of "Crown Copyright" looks like a copy-and-paste from the DIA's Crown/NZ Government web standards v1 copyright notice. It's probably wrong or invalid in the case of Horizon, which is a Regional Council and not part of the NZ Government. The Local Government Act doesn't say local authorities are considered part of the Crown; LGA s8 refers to 'the Crown' as a separate body, which is not bound by the Local Government Act, except for limited oversight roles.
If Crown Copyright doesn't apply to the councils and a council website doesn't contain a specific Copyright notice, then all the default protections of the Copyright Act presumedly remain in force. However, a council would dare media and public outrage by trying to enforce those rights.
Effect of OIA/LGOIMA on copyright
It's important to note that use of OIA/LGOIMA to extract information doesn't negate Crown Copyright or waive rights under the Copyright Act for any supplied information. But in reality it seems an agency or council can't, or won't, enforce copyright in those situations: to do so would contradict the entire point of OIA/LGOIMA, risk a PR nightmare and likely trigger a public showdown with the Office of the Ombudsmen. So effectively a copyright waiver applies to information and data released under OIA/LGOIMA.
This is why the Copyright Act / OIA / LGOIMA should be modified to lean towards defacto waiver of copyright for all Crown and council information and data, except where privacy and security sensitivities are involved. Because:
- that information can be accessed under OIA/LGOIMA, and once it's released under those acts, it seems copyright is effectively waived.
- an NZ citizen who receives Crown/council information or data from a non-authoritative source can't reasonably know whether it was released under the OIA/LGOIMA or not, and therefore can't know what rights effectively apply.
- an agency or council is unlikely to dare media and public outrage by trying to enforce copyright over government/council information and data, whether it's been released under OIA/LGOIMA or not.
Crown Copyright and existing waivers
Crown Copyright is described in s26 of the Copyright Act. Waiver of Crown Copyright for certain types of information (primarily material emanating directly from Parliament) is described in s27.
Default rights under the Copyright Act
The copyright holder has the exclusive rights:
- (a) To copy the work:
- (b) To issue copies of the work to the public, whether by sale or otherwise:
- (c) To perform the work in public:
- (d) To play the work in public:
- (e) To show the work in public:
- (f) to communicate the work to the public:
- (g) To make an adaptation of the work:
- (h) To do any of the acts referred to in any of paragraphs (a) to (f) of this subsection in relation to an adaptation of the work:
- (i) To authorise another person to do any of the acts referred to in any of paragraphs (a) to (h) of this subsection.
- Ed Corkery 00:55, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
