[Open-Legislation] Reply to: API for EU legislation

[Francis Davey]

2011/5/26 stef <stefan.marsiske at gmail.com>:
> Dear Nils Erik,
>
> On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 12:30:45PM +0200, Niels Erik Kaaber Rasmussen wrote:
>> I found your thread on our EU API here (dated May 6) and would be
>> glad to know which kind of terms and conditions you'd like to see
>> present at the API. The data is not ours it is taken from different
>> official sources, so we can't really license it - what we can do is
>> to provide a free an open interface for others to use it.
>
> i understand this problem, and this is also my main concern. i'm unsure about
> eu db rights, the odbl could be a good solution to our problems. maybe a MEP
> asking some questions regarding the legal status of the data on
> europarl.eu would also bring more light to this issue.
>

It seems unlikely that the EU has any database right in the data (on
_Fixtures Marketing_ principles). But all the material will be subject
to copyright (or at least may be) and while database right is
harmonised, copyright isn't. So I'm not sure who would own copyright
in any of the material contained in the database. In the UK a report
of a speech in Parliament would belong both (i) to the MP and (ii) to
the person who wrote it down. I am rapidly trying to learn French
copyright law, but that won't help for anything happening in Brussels.

-- 
Francis Davey