----------------------------Original message---------------------------- > >I was reading a little item about government copyright in a local Minneapolis > >paper. Many non-federal governements that have not copyrighted material are > >looking at copyright as a way to generate revenue. Much of the debate seems > >to be that copyright might mean less public access (and it would mean map > >publishers would have to pay to use govermenet base materials). It got me > >thinking: > > > >1. As I recall, crown (government) copyright in Britain is perpetual (I know > >this is true of Oxford and Cambridge U. Presses). Am I remembering rightly? > > > >2. Is this still true of Ordnance Survey with its reformation into a > >semi-autonomous agency? In the US, once the Postal Service separated from the > >governement in 1971, they were no longer considered governement publishers > >and were able to copyright stamp designs. In Ireland, the Ordnance Survey definitely claims copyright on anything and everything it thinks it can get away with :-) They even claim that use of the (Irish) National Grid is itself copyrightable though I don't know how this would stand up in court... Apparently this copyright extends back to old editions of still-current (and I think superceded) maps, even if these were initially produced before independence, when there was just one Ordnance Survey covering both Britain and Ireland. Darius Bartlett