Re: [Fsfe-uk] [OT-ish] Government food data

[Alex Hudson]

On Tue, 2005-10-11 at 18:18 +0100, Philip Hunt wrote:
> On Tuesday 11 October 2005 17:37, Alex Hudson wrote:
> > I'm not sure that's even necessarily true. This data is probably subject
> > to database copyright at least, 
> 
> I was under the impression that mere facts -- such as the carbohydrate values 
> of foods -- were not copyrightable. Am I wrong?

You're sadly wrong :( Collections of facts are copyrightable - database
copyright. E.g., phonebooks, that kind of thing.

> My understanding is that stuff produced by the Federal government is 
> automatically public domain.

I know it's not subject to US copyright, but I don't know about whether
or not that counts for other countries. There isn't a global 'public
domain', copyright is a national issue (subject to the whims of Berne,
obviously). I'm guessing since Berne 'only' requires you to recognise
foreign copyrights, that it probably is essentially copyright free, but
I don't know - database rights are kind of new and all.

Cheers,

Alex.