[Freegis-list] vmap copyright

[Adrian Custer]

You are all right, free and clear,

By and large data produced by the us government has to be released into
the public domain. Once released tough, organizations can take it and
copyright their version of the data. You in this case could decide to
copyright the data modifications you have made.

ESRI was contracted by the us government to process Vmap data into a
coherent whole. They, perhaps illegally, have copyrighted their
modifications. Since the maproom at U Penn used the ESRI data as a
basis, it restricts you freedom due to ESRI's policies. If you do not
use their data as a source, they have no claim to your work.

As long as you start with the miltary data, you are clear and free of
any restrictions of what you can do with the data.

The email you cite is correct to my best understanding.

cheers,
adrian


On Fri, 2002-01-25 at 09:45, Benoit Véler wrote:
> Hello,
> 
>          I am finishing a project with some vmap0 data, and I'm begining to 
> have an awfull doubt : are these data really free of copyright ?
>          I have downloaded the file V0eur at the adress :
> 
>          http://geoengine.nima.mil/ftpdir/archive/vpf_data/
> 
>          I have made two type of operations on this data :
> 
>          * extraction of specific areas (covering several countries),
>          * modification of both vector and attributes files.
> 
>          From that point, I used to consider that these database could be 
> considered as my own one, and I planned to resell it an a web site.
>          But when I read the two sources here :
> 
>          http://intevation.de/pipermail/freegis-list/2001-January/000232.html
> 
>          and
> 
>          http://www.maproom.psu.edu/dcw/faq/ques1.html
> 
>          I am becoming really doubtfull... Can anybody give me his opinion 
> on this pb, or do you know a place where I could have the information for 
> sure ?...
> 
>          Best regards,
> 
>          Ben. 
> 
> 
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