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City Laws Only Available Via $200 License
MrLint writes "The City of Schenectady has decided that their laws are copyrighted, and that you cannot know them without paying for an 'exclusive license' for $200. This is not a first — Oregon has claimed publishing of laws online is a copyright violation." This case is nuanced. The city has contracted with a private company to convert and encode its laws so they can be made available on the Web for free. While the company works on this project, it considers the electronic versions of the laws its property and offers a CD version, bundled with its software, for $200. The man who requested a copy of the laws plans to appeal.
In my experience the "ignorance of the law is no excuse" standpoint holds up whether or not you have a good excuse for your ignorance. The police once copied down my address incorrectly on a ticket (they ignored my correct address on the copy of the ticket I mailed in) causing a summons to court, a notice of default judgement against me, a notice that my ticket was unpaid and a notice that my license had been suspended to be sent to the wrong address. I was later charged with driving with a suspended license after an accident a few months later. I discovered what had happened after some digging at the bureau of public records. I explained what had happened to the judge and he told me the ignorance of the law is ones own fault period. The fact that the state had tried to contact me was sufficient on their part. It is always your responsibility to become informed of the law regardless of any difficulties you have.
Judge was an idiot. Ignorance of the _law_ is no excuse. Ignorance of specific FACTS often is; ignorance of the law in your case would be if you knew your license was suspended but you didn't know that driving with a suspended license was illegal.
In this case, the courts will (as usual) rule for the government. On two grounds
1) You can always head down to the state capital and examine the laws in their law library, on paper.
2) States have long been incorporating copyrighted codes into their laws by reference, and the courts have been perfectly happy to let them do it. Want to add an electrical outlet? That'll be $$$$ for the NEC, please.
The more interesting case will be if some enterprising person buys the $200 CD, strips the laws themselves out of it (minus any formatting or commentary by the publishing company), and posts them or starts selling his own CD.