[okfn-za] Restrictive licences on government websites

Thu Apr 4 15:35:07 UTC 2013

Hi All

I took a quick survey of a number of government websites, all the
provincial sites, the Metro municipalities, StatsSA, the Demarcation Board,
Parliament and the IEC website. Each site had a restrictive terms of use.
No-one allows for commercial use of data, some (Cape Town and eThekwini)
don't even allow for redistribution of data (e.g. publishing on an open
data portal).

I didn't realise that public institutions were allowws to claim copyright
on data funded through taxes. Am I being naive? Without clear and less
restrictive licensing, I don't think that open data as a movement can
proceed in South Africa. Every time that data is used, we need to start
asking difficult questions about who is allowed to use it and for what
purpose. In many cases, explicit permission is required for the simplest of
projects.

I've put together a simple spreadsheet in case anyone wants to review the
licences for themselves.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Aob-MaYrXUiDdFZUaEs4WF9IT2ZLTnd5cG4zZk9XQ2c&usp=sharing

Thoughts?
Adi

-- 
Adi Eyal
Data Specialist
phone: +27 78 014 2469
skype: adieyalcas
linkedin: http://za.linkedin.com/pub/dir/Adi/Eyal
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