Hi all,



Many of the NGA maps are made with data supplied by foreign allied countries that do not consider their geographic data in the public domain.  Their agreements with NGA may not allow for public distribution of the resulting materials in the same manner that we distribute government collected information. There have been gaps in what foreign nautical charts were distributed online because of that.  It may be that they were all taken down because it has become a manpower drain to parse out which can be made available from which ones can’t.



On a side note, if you look at your paper nautical charts of non-US waters, you will see copyright notices on some.  I seem to recall that charts made with information provided by the United kingdom Hydrographic Office  are subject to copyright.



Kathy Stroud



From: Maps-L: Map Librarians, etc. [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Angela R Cope

Sent: Friday, April 03, 2015 10:18 AM

To: [log in to unmask]

Subject: Re: NGA Nautical charts





Thanks for sharing Michael.







​I don't recall hearing about this. We treat nautical charts like they're not copyrighted (giving high resolution tiffs to anyone who wants them). Can someone explain why NOAA/NGA maps are copyrighted? ​







This is another reason to be careful about weeding collections simply because maps are online. These online map collections are so ephemeral.







Angie



AGSL







opinions are my own



________________________________

From: Maps-L: Map Librarians, etc. <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> on behalf of Fry, Michael <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>

Sent: Friday, April 3, 2015 10:11 AM

To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>

Subject: [MAPS-L] NGA Nautical charts



Maybe this isn't news to you all, but I just discovered that the online index and chart viewer that gave the public access to hi-res versions of NGA's nautical charts of non-US coastal waters worldwide have been taken down from NOAA's site. (A couple of years ago they removed most charts due to copyright restrictions. Now they've removed them all.)



See my correspondence with NOAA/OCS below...



For the moment, some charts are still viewable online at www.nauticalchartsonline.com<http://www.nauticalchartsonline.com>. Not sure how long that'll last if copyright is the obstacle to free online access.



mf



Original message: Hi,

Not too long ago, the nauticalcharts.noaa.gov<http://nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/> website hosted indexes to NGA nautical charts of non-US waters and hi-res versions of charts from the handful of regions (1, 5 and 9?) that they still had permission to make freely available.



I don't see this resource available anymore. Has it moved, or has NGA removed all of their nautical charts from free public access?



Thank you.

Michael Fry

Map Librarian and Map Editor

National Geographic Society

[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>; 202.857.7098<tel:202.857.7098>



OCS response: Thank you for contacting NOAA. Due to copyright restrictions, we had to remove all NGA charts from our web site.





--

Michael Fry

Map Editor and Senior Map Librarian

National Geographic Society

1145 17th St. N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20036

202.857.7098 and 202.791.1892

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