Forwarded, as ‘a case study’ in UK versus USA . . .

(And thanks to Theresa Marguerite Quill for yesterday’s posting, on ‘MAPS-L’, Janice Pilch’s compilation, that I shall next forward to ‘Lis-maps’ over here. I wonder whether ‘our’ John Davies took her “It’s complicated” from that?)

Francis Herbert (retarded Curator of Maps, RGS-IBG)

From: A forum for issues related to map & spatial data librarianship [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of John Davies
Sent: 25 January 2017 11:23
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: Soviet military maps and copyright

"It's complicated!"

Bodleian Publishing in UK took (expensive) legal advice in respect of a proposed book containing excerpts of Cold War era Soviet maps (1960s-80s) and consequently abandoned the project at a late stage of production. Although no case law exists, they felt that under English law, publication carried a potential risk of copyright contravention.

Subsequently, University of Chicago Press took a different view and have announced proposed publication of a similar book - see redatlasbook.com

The legal position has never been tested in a court of law and any lawyerly advice is 'opinion'.

John

On 25/01/2017 10:25, Francis Herbert wrote:

Forwarded from ‘MAPS-L’: a small update (?), with which – surely – all British Isles map curators with examples of this mapping will be familiar . . .?

PS: This morning (UK time) I’ve responded more fully to Tom Brittnacher’s personal ‘thanks’ email to me of yesterday. And supplied CCS’s url together with ‘naming of names’ (John Cruickshank, John Davies, Alexander Kent, and young Martin Davis).

FH

From: Maps-L: Map Librarians, etc. [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Angela R Cope
Sent: 23 January 2017 19:54
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Soviet military maps and copyright
From 2013 ...

-------- Original Message --------
Subject:        Soviet Copyright FYI
Date:   Fri, 11 Jan 2013 14:22:36 +0000
From:   Quill, Theresa Marguerite <[log in to unmask]>
To:     '[log in to unmask]' <[log in to unmask]>
 
Good morning fellow mapheads!
 
I thought y’all might be interested in this: According to a librarian at
the National Library of Russia, materials published before 1942 are not
covered under Russian copyright law. For our library, that means most of
our Soviet Military Topos can be digitized!!
 
DISCLAIMER: Digitize at your own risk. I’m not a Russian legal scholar,
and this information comes from one librarian, but from the little
research I did, this seems legit.
 
--
 
Theresa Quill
 
Map/GIS Associate
 
Herman B. Wells Library
 
Indiana University- Bloomington
From: Maps-L: Map Librarians, etc. <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Tom Brittnacher <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, January 23, 2017 1:33 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [MAPS-L] Soviet military maps and copyright

Has anyone dealt with Soviet military maps from a copyright perspective, such as when reproducing maps or making map scans available online? What is your interpretation of copyright law regarding Soviet materials? Although they didn't sign the Berne Convention, they became a signatory of the Universal Copyright Convention in 1973. This stuff is usually best left to copyright lawyers, but in the meantime, are there any thoughts?
Thanks,
Tom
--
Tom Brittnacher
Geospatial Data Curator

UCSB Library
University of California
Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9010
(805)893-2366
[log in to unmask]