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Subject: CUAC Conference Call with National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
Date: Mon, 27 Jun 2005
From: "Zellmer, Linda R" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Hello,
On Tuesday Morning, several members of CUAC had a conference call with
Jim Mohan and Mark Schultz of the National Geospatial Intelligence
Agency concerning their proposal to remove Aeronautical products from
public sale
(http://www.nga.mil/NGASiteContent/StaticFiles/OCR/nga0411.pdf). CUAC
sent a letter to comment on the proposal. This letter was also shared
with other map library organizations. Below you will find a summary of
our conference call. This summary was proofed and approved by CUAC
members who participated in the Conference Call as well as Jim Mohan of NGA.
Linda Zellmer
==================================================================================
CUAC Participants: Mark Jacquith, Bruce Obenhaus, John Olson, Joanne
Perry, Dan Seldin, T. Wangyal Shawa, Linda Zellmer
NGA Participants: Mark Schultz, Director, Corporate Relations Office,
NGA, Jim Mohan, NGA Corporate Relations Office
Members of the Cartographic Users Advisory Council met by conference
call with Mark Schultz, Director of the National Geospatial Intelligence
Agency’s Office of Corporate Relations, and Jim Mohan, a member of the
NGA Corporate Relations Office, to discuss library issues related to
NGA’s proposal to limit access to aeronautical charts and other NGA
aeronautical products. We agreed that access to the chart information is
our primary concern.
Several participants summarized how the aeronautical charts are used in
their collections. For example, they are used by researchers who are
preparing to do field work, by students who need basic information (such
as elevation data) which is not readily available in gazetteers and for
other cultural information, such as place names and general geography.
Aeronautical charts are especially useful in libraries because they
provide information in areas of the World where our collections may be
weak, such as Africa and South America. Because of limited budgets, most
map libraries cannot afford to purchase topographic or cultural maps for
all areas of the World, so we depend on the aeronautical charts (which
are provided free through the Federal Depository Library Program) to
fill in these gaps. While this information may not be very current, it
is still useful. It is also useful because it provides a historical
context as well.
Copyright was also discussed, because NGA obtains their data from
foreign countries through bilateral data sharing agreements (countries
provide data to each other through exchange agreements). Many countries
have a fair use clause, which allows researchers to use information for
non-commercial educational and scientific research. However, these
countries, some of which depend on sales of their products to fund their
update, are concerned that NGA aeronautical products that contain
information obtained through data sharing agreements are being used
commercially. NGA could include a copyright warning on their maps. The
library community understands that copyright should be respected.
Like many agencies, NGA is moving towards digital production of charts.
At some point, they may entirely cease production of paper products. In
the case of hydrographic products, most countries have agreed that
small-scale data, with scales of 1:1,000,000 or smaller, is not that
useful to commercial organizations and have made that data freely
available for downloading. The aeronautical community has not yet
reached that point, although it could come. They are making the Shuttle
Radar Topography Mission data freely available to the public. This has a
30 meter resolution in the United States and 90 meter resolution for the
rest of the World. While this is a rich data set, there are some holes,
especially in mountainous areas.
The NGA will be meeting with other groups that have expressed concern
about the proposal from July to September. They may put out a notice at
the end of the month stating that the public comment period has closed.
An announcement of their final decision will come later in the year.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Linda Zellmer
Head, Geology Library
Geology Building, Room 601
1001 E. 10th Street
Bloomington, Indiana 47405-1405
Phone: (812) 855-2275 Fax: (812) 855-6614
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