[od-discuss] ISO Codes

Tue Nov 18 07:02:04 UTC 2014

On 2014-11-17 22:16, Michael Roberts wrote:
> Hi,
> Daniel Dietrich recommend I post this question here.  
> 
> For those designing standards or using ISO codes ( things like ISO
> Country codes ) are we violating copyright and/or the spirit of things
> like the Open Definition?  The reason I ask is on the ISO website it has
> a PDF that says the following:
> 
>   http://www.iso.org/iso/copyright_information_brochure.pdf 
>
> "Whether intentionally or unknowingly, a significant number of standards
> users are breaking copyright laws by reproducing and/or redistributing
> standards. Contributing to the violation of copyright results in lost
> revenue for the organizations developing and distributing standards,
> which not only include ISO and IEC but also their respective members
> and authorized distributors. It also jeopardizes the standards
> themselves by putting them at risk of tampering and/or inadvertent
> modifications.
> 
> ISO and IEC introduced online sales several years ago in response to
> client demand for fast and convenient access to standards. Unfortunately,
> ease of access has made illegal photocopying easier and Internet
> distribution has also increased the potential for standards to be
> obtained or distributed illegally. 
> 
> ISO and IEC International Standards are sold in order to help fund the
> very process that leads to their development."
> 
> Are we violating copyright by using them in the creation of standards
> like IATI - which reference country code lists in the XML, not to
> mention are posted on the IATI website. It seems like everyone is using
> them and republishing them but should we?

The only thing that /can/ be copyrighted is the full text of the
standards, i.e. the documents that are published by ISO and IEC.

/Data/ that are part of the standards, such as the ISO Country codes
(defined by the ISO 3166 suite of standards) cannot be copyrighted and
the use of these codes in within the IATI framework (and similar) does
not infringe upon ISO's copyright.

For the record: I don't think ISO is saying it is illegal to use this
data in the PDF linked to.

What they are complaining about is "illegal photocopying" and other
means of verbatim copying of the full text of the standard. They do
not try to prevent people from using this data, or prevent the creation
of new frameworks or standards that builds upon data extracted from
ISO standards.  Nor can they legally do so.
-- 
- gisle hannemyr [ gisle{at}hannemyr.no - http://folk.uio.no/gisle/ ]
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