Federal Court decision reminding everyone that there is no copyright in data

[Paul Norman]

I sent this email out to another group, but it's relevant here as well.

The Federal Court of Appeal has issued a decision reminding the parties
involved that copyright does not cover data. The decision was one about a
summary judgment, so the case is not over, but I'll be watching it to see
what happens.

There's an article at
http://www.teresascassa.ca/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=124:federal-
court-of-appeal-reminds-government-there-is-no-copyright-in-data and the
relevant decision is
http://www.canlii.org/en/ca/fca/doc/2013/2013fca63/2013fca63.html

"However, there is no principle of property law that would preclude anyone
from making use of information displayed in a publicly available paper
nautical chart, even if the information originated with the Crown or is
maintained by the Crown."

The court found the license was inconsistent with what it was authorizing
one of the parties to reproduce, finding an ambiguity of the license because
one reading was that it was licensing copyright in "CHS Data", a copyright
that did not exist.

It's worth nothing that this is not a new principle, but merely a
reiteration of a well-established principle.

Undoubtedly this impacts some of the materials on the Vancouver Open Data
site but absent a statement from the city on what on their site is only
information (and therefore not protected by copyright) the only way we'd
figure out what it impacts is a court case.