Slashdot Mirror
Canada Post Files Copyright Lawsuit Over Crowd-sourced Postal Code Database
An anonymous reader writes "Canada Post has filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Geolytica, which operates GeoCoder.ca,
a website that provides several geocoding services including free access to a crowd-sourced, compiled database of Canadian postal codes. Canada Post argues that it is the exclusive copyright holder of all
Canadian postal codes and claims that GeoCoder appropriated the database and made unauthorized reproductions. GeoCoder compiled the postal code database by using crowdsourcing techniques, without
any reliance on Canada Post's database, and argues that there can be no copyright on postal codes and thus no infringement (PDF)."
In Socialist Canada, Post Office stamps you!
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
As much as I think the idea of copyrighting post codes is stupid, surely the source of the data doesn't matter. That is like taking a picture, looking at each pixel, manually selecting a similar color pixel and creating a new image, then claiming that you own copyright on this new image. Postcodes should be as uncopyrightable as information about the boundary between counties.
What operations do they fulfill anyways?
Right, they STRIKE!
I'd say that postal codes aren't "works of authorship" entitled to copyright protection. It looks like the canadian lawyer is making a similar argument from paragraph 23 on.
Oh, wait ... I am a lawyer ...
My first reaction was: It's a Dangerous path, once "facts" can become copyrighted. Then I (gasp) RTFA.
There are two claims made by the article:
1) Canada Post argues that it is the exclusive copyright holder of all Canadian postal codes
If the issue is #1, then this is truly asinine, in my opinion. I am no scholar of copyright law, especially how it is applied in Canada. This claim may or may not be true. However, I could find no evidence the the Canada Post made such a claim. I may not have searched through the links provided with enough thoroughness. But, could it be that the author of the article either assumed it, or simply made it up? Does anyone have support for this claim, which to me seems absurd?
2) Canada Post says GeoCoder appropriated the database and made unauthorized reproductions.
If the issue is #2 They claim that there were "unauthorized reproductions" of their database made. This could be a legitimate copyright infringement. Again. I see no evidence that Canada Post makes this claim either.
In fact, I see no mention of "copyright" other than in the article. There is just this post: ... which states that Canada Post is suing for lost revenue.
http://geocoder.ca/?sued=1
Now, these claims may in fact be true, and I don't necessarily doubt them. I would however like to see solid links to sources, for instance the text of the lawsuit. It's difficult to figure out what is fact and what is speculation.
Canada Post hasn't sought to stop these directories from including the postal codes, so I don't believe it should seek to stop an online publication either.
In other respects, Canada Post has shown itself to be a fairly forward thinker for a government operation. To me, the fact that Geolytica has created their website is proof that there is a market opportunity there that Canada Post has overlooked. Canada Post could; and I dare say should, simply out compete Geolytica by creating a more comprehensive and easier to use web page of its own. Canada Post might not be able to compete with the US listings Geolytica also has, but I think there is much room for improvement on the look and feel of the web page itself. (How many run of the mill users even know the difference between HTML, XML and JSON let alone *care*? geocoder.ca uses google maps, but it doesn't look as if they took any design ideas from Google)
I need a wheelchair van for my son. Help me get the word out. https://www.gofundme.com/wheelchair-van-for-jj
A postal code is a short numeric sequence that makes it easier for the postman to deliver a package/letter to the right building/apartment. It is really not much different, functionally speaking, from a telephone number, an email address or a room number. Are telephone numbers copyrighted? Don't think so. Are email addresses copyrighted? I've never heard of such a thing. Copyrighting room numbers in a building? Not even technically possible. And who pays for postal codes to be created/used in the first place? The Canadian taxpayer. That should make postal codes a "public good", owned collectively by the taxpaying Canadian public. Creating a free listing of postal codes, where anyone can look up postal codes, is a convenience, and a service rendered to the public. And a good one too, since it is "free", and nobody profits from it. Besides, if search engines can index the entire f___ing Internet, without anyone crying "Oy! That's my copyrighted webpage you are indexing!", how can a simple "Canadian postal code lookup function" be a breach of copyright? If the article is correct, the site in question didn't even copy the Postal Services postal code database. It built its own, from user contributions. I really don't see how "copyright" even figures into this case...
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
A guy creates a site that makes it easier for customer's to use their service, why the hell are they suing him?
This blatant and unlawful activity must stop. Every day millions of post items are sent with Postal Codes illegally and unlawfully printed on them by people not under the employ or direction of the Postal Service.
We must start a campaign to get people to stop placing these postal codes on their post so that the Postal Service can rightfully keep their Postal Code System all to themselves.
If postcodes are copyright, then everyone who uses one should be paying a license fee, right?
Just point this out, then everyone stops using the postcode, and see how quickly they come around when they have to employ many, many more sorting staff for each post office.
From personal experience, Canada Post increased ten-fold their database licensing costs. My company tried to negotiate, and the best CP proposed is some rebates for the first two years, so of course we had to drop them. So, Geocoder, good luck!
I think that there is only one solution to a - stupid (IMO) - claim like this.
Stop using postalcodes when posting letters to/in Canada.
I - for one - wouldn't like to be using copyrighted information on letters I'm sending.
Mabe Canada Post would think twice before claiming copyright on information that benefits them.
If the database stopped existing 3 years ago, then it would be elegible for statute of limitations protections. I wonder how adverse possession laws would work here.
Common law countries are split about this. In the USA, phone numbers cannot be copyrighted, but in Australia, for example, they can.
In the US, this issue was settled in Feist vs. Rural Telephone, which was about copyright in telephone directories. The US Supreme Court ruled that such collections of facts are not copyrightable on constitutional grounds. In Canada, there's Tele-Direct (Publications) Inc. v. American Business Information, Inc, which covers much the same ground. "Labour alone not determinative of originality ... Compilation so obvious, commonplace not meriting copyright protection."
I'm surprised CanadaPost even raised the issue.
If it was only 2 days later, it sure as h*** didn't go via Canada Post.
It's not like anyone uses them all that much any more. The month-long postal strike last summer (and the subsequent month to clear out the backlog) was the final straw for a lot of people.
Let's call it what it is, Anti-Social Media.
> otherwise it's fair game like Aspirin or Kleenex
Could you stop assuming that every country in the word use the USA laws ?
Thankfully, it's not the case.
Common law is already terrible and it's even worse in the states.
I'm so glade to live in a country using roman law.
now i am not legal expert but afaik the statute of limitations usually is counted from when you stop doing the illegal activity, not from when you started it.
so if the DB is still operating, then it is not outside the statute of limitations.
i hope the canadian post loses this case as i don't think postal codes should be copyrightable, but a defense of this being outside of the statute of limitations would be laughed at by the judge and the prosecution.
... what a bunch of maroons!
The best part is how the plaintiff claims that their case depends on "Section 63" of the CPC act. There is no section 63!
http://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-10/
Be careful with the creative expressions argument. I wouldn't say Britney Spear's work is particularly creative, but apparently it's covered by copyright law.
We could do just fine with once-a-week delivery, which would drastically cut both costs and prices, while improving service (look at all the places where there is NO mail delivery because they've been built in the last 2 decades, so you need to go and pick it up at a "community mailbox"). It's not like a letter gets delivered the next day anyway, and they deliver more junk mail and ad mail than real mail.
So - go to 1-day-a-week (or 2 days if you must, sort of like garbage pickup), and re-instate door-to-door service to everyone, while reducing prices.
Let's call it what it is, Anti-Social Media.
It may also be that FedEx, UPS, Purolator and other couriers have already splashed out the $5000 to buy a copy of the database, in order to make the delivery of their mail easier.
Also, Copyright != Trademarks. In order to defend a trademark, you have to be actively using it. Not so with copyright.
The reason why Canada Post hasn't sued the companies you describe is because it benefits them for those post codes be out there - it encourages companies and people to use Canada Post's services.
I will simplify it for you.
Just more government-union greed.
Postal codes are by defacto public information. Just desperate for money Posties want a royalty. Should just say stuff it.
on Canada Post website. What's the problem?
I kinda find it funny that your post is marked funny, but damn if that isn't the truth. I've switched to DHL for my regular mail if it has to be sent. I can send a letter from ontario to northern alberta or the territories for under $2. And it'll get there within 3-5 days. The last time I sent a letter via canada post it took nearly a month. Including the week it sat in edmonton.
Om, nomnomnom...
You are conflating copyrights and trademarks.
They are different. Trademarks must be defended as you describe. Copyrights do not.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Is a copyright violation in Canada, because of the postal code?
They are still one of the most economical ways to receive online purchases. Especially the $0.99 shipping included cables from Hong Kong.
And unlike UPS, Fedex, etc. if you aren't home for delivery of a parcel, picking it up at the local pharmacy is a lot more convenient than:
-Going to the depot in the industrial park 45 minutes away before 5PM
-Or allowing them to leave a computer on your front doorstep in the rain while you're at work.
They still rely on city and province as a fall back, right? Seems if they are "copyrighted" then you should send mail without using the postal codes.
Just to clarify the postal strike last year, the postal service was on strike orders to be sure, but they were doing day-long local strikes. That didn't cause any serious problem to anybody other than a delay in your mail by a day or two at most.
After that, the harper government stepped in and said "Either settle this shit, or we will FORCE you to accept THIS agreement."
That agreement was LESS than what Canada Post was already willing to give to the workers. Immediately after that, Canada Post locked out ALL of the workers across the country and stopped negotiating in good faith. After all, they just had to wait and pretend they were listening to the union.
If people have a last straw for anybody, it should be for the Conservatives that ruined any possibility of proper contract negotiations.
Longitude and latitude existed long before the US government was born. I doubt they can even attempt to make that claim.
Supporter of the +1 Over Dramatic mod option. In memory of apk.
Please try to keep in mind, these laws are old, and not being under the reign of a monarch is new. These issues will affect every former UK colony.
It is really not much different, functionally speaking, from a telephone number, an email address or a room number. Are telephone numbers copyrighted? Don't think so. Are email addresses copyrighted? I've never heard of such a thing.
Australia and NZ are still hashing it out, actually.
http://www.baldwins.com/australian-and-new-zealand-copyright-law-for-databases-compilations-and-directories/
And who pays for postal codes to be created/used in the first place? The Canadian taxpayer. That should make postal codes a "public good", owned collectively by the taxpaying Canadian public. Creating a free listing of postal codes, where anyone can look up postal codes, is a convenience, and a service rendered to the public.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_copyright#Canada
"Permission to reproduce Government of Canada works, in part or in whole, and by any means, for personal or public non-commercial purposes, or for cost-recovery purposes, is not required, unless otherwise specified in the material you wish to reproduce."
And a good one too, since it is "free", and nobody profits from it.
The "otherwise specified" part would seem to be the $5000 Canada Post wants to charge for its directory. Which it has the right to do. Statistics Canada also charges for its data, one of the few places where government documents are not free. Why? Because information has value. The Do Not Call List has a trivial price attached to it, and has been exploited to high hell because foreign telemarketers can afford to do it and are not bound by our laws. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Do_Not_Call_List#Criticism
Besides, if search engines can index the entire f___ing Internet, without anyone crying "Oy! That's my copyrighted webpage you are indexing!",
Ok, now you're just starting to look silly and ill informed...
http://searchengineland.com/proposed-uk-law-would-immunize-search-engines-against-copyright-claims-33336
http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/04/08/industry-google-afp-dc-idUSN0728115420070408
http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1457-Search-Engines-Indexing-and-Copyright-Law
http://www.blogstudiolegalefinocchiaro.com/wordpress/?p=258
how can a simple "Canadian postal code lookup function" be a breach of copyright? If the article is correct, the site in question didn't even copy the Postal Services postal code database. It built its own, from user contributions. I really don't see how "copyright" even figures into this case...
It's not the engine, it's the data. Postal codes were *authored*, there is no question about that.
At least not in the US, but I'm pretty sure that applies to Canada also. If they did indeed crowd-source the data, this lawsuit should be DOA.
make imaginary.friends COUNT=100 VISIBLE=false
Really? Would you care to discuss that further? I'm happy with common law in a lot of ways (although we've got a lot of statutes mucking it up), but I've never understood the appeal of Roman law.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
Agreed. UPS and Fedex charge a king's ransom and the pick-up locations are not even reachable by public transit in many cities. The USPS + Canada Post combo for shipments from the States is the only economical way, and in my experience it's not nearly as slow as many are claiming.
H0H 0H0
I can order online from a store in Vancouver on Monday, and have a parcel of my stuff delivered a few thousand km away on Friday, for $5 in shipping. That's totally respectable in my books.
I sent out my wedding invitations on Monday night via Canada post (which means they were actually collected Tuesday). Most seem to have arrived Friday (I was visiting family and asked). Granted, these were all within Ontario. I'd expect another day or two for my family in BC to receive theirs.
Not bad for $0.61.
-- Seq
It is somehow faster for the letter to be delivered to the border, clear customs, and then make its way through the Canada Post system, than if it started out in the Canada Post system to begin with. The reason behind this I would like to know.
A lot of people in BC do it (Point Roberts is a reasonably popular place for that, since the border crossing is not heavily loaded, as people pretty much only come there for that & shopping). When I inquired, I've been told that it's cheaper that way, because the mail is no longer "international". Especially ironic in case of Point Roberts, as they actually have to drive the mail back into Canada to move it to the rest of U.S.
I heard that with maps instead of math tables, putting errors in on purpose to help notice infringement
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartography#Cartographic_errors
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
The speed depends on where your mail gets sorted. This last year, the Peterborough Ontario mail was no longer sorted locally, it all goes to Ottawa before coming back to local addresses. In the past, mail to the local region was separated out locally and then delivered, now that all goes to Ottawa. For mail destined for out-of-town, it probably makes no difference. For mail to my neighbours, it adds at least a couple of days to the delivery time.
It's protected by unintellectual property law. :P
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Sadly, sending that same cable from Canada to Hong Kong would cost a minimum of $5 by air.
if canada is anything like finland it would cost 7 bucks to just send them to your neighbor.
and it's local business that takes the hit. cheap local postages would foster local businesses.
but it's pretty rich to claim ownership of postal numbers. next phase claim ownership of addresses and start asking private parcel companies for a cut.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
CDDB all over again? y/n?
######
Are they suing over a d/l of the DB?
Or over a recompilation of the data?
The former: dumbassery if in violation of their license.
The latter: unpopportable in the USA, in CA? WTFK.
Um Whoops?
The way I see it, that is the crux of the case.
If it WAS crowd sourced then I don't seen an issue, they are doing their own data collection. If they STOLE the database from which the information is created from (and likely sold and licenced from), then yes, that would be an issue.
Of course how does one "appropriate" a database? Are they claiming they were hacked? Likely it exposes security flaws and unaccountability within Canada Post, as in who as access to the production database, and how could someone copy it and give it away (which is probably what happened if that is the case). It could just be sour grapes that Geocoder is getting at the information from another source. Though realistically I have to say, how good do you think a crowd sourced postal code database is? Makes me wonder... I guess it really depends on how large and regionally diverse that crowd is.
I just went through this with UPS.. Sent my sun glasses to the USA because they broke and are under warranty. Have to pay $25 return shipping which is a lot but OK. The dummies sent the package back to Canada using UPS and I get dinged $40. UPS is a motherfucking scam