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Submitted Comments on the 'Government Open Data Use License - India'
http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/submitted-comments-on-the-government-open-data-use-license-india
<b>The public consultation process of the draft open data license to be used by Government of India has ended yesterday. Here we share the text of the submission by CIS. It was drafted by Anubha Sinha, Pranesh Prakash, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay.</b>
<p> </p>
<p><em>The following comments on the 'Government Open Data Use License - India' was drafted by Anubha Sinha, Pranesh Prakash, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay, and submitted through the <a href="https://www.mygov.in/group-issue/public-consultation-government-open-data-use-license-india/">MyGov portal</a> on July 25, 2016. The original submission can be found <a href="https://www.mygov.in/sites/default/files/mygov_146946521043358971.pdfh">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr />
<h2>I. Preliminary</h2>
<ol>
<li>This submission presents comments by the Centre for Internet and Society (“<strong>CIS</strong>”) <strong>[1]</strong> on the draft Government Open Data Use License - India (“<strong>the draft licence</strong>”) <strong>[2]</strong> by the Department of Legal Affairs.<br /><br /></li>
<li>This submission is based on the draft licence released on the MyGov portal on June 27, 2016 <strong>[3]</strong>.<br /><br /></li>
<li>CIS commends the Department of Ministry of Law and Justice, Government of India for its efforts at seeking inputs from various stakeholders prior to finalising its open data licence. CIS is thankful for the opportunity to have been a part of the discussion during the framing of the licence; and to provide this submission, in furtherance of the feedback process continuing from the draft licence.</li></ol>
<h2>II. Overview</h2>
<ol start="4">
<li>The Centre for Internet and Society is a non-governmental organisation engaged in research and policy work in the areas of, inter alia, access to knowledge and openness. This clause-by-clause submission is consistent with CIS’ commitment to safeguarding general public interest, and the interests and rights of various stakeholders involved. Accordingly, the comments in this submission aim to further these principles and are limited to those clauses that most directly have an impact on them.</li></ol>
<h2>III. Comments and Recommendations</h2>
<ol start="5">
<li><strong>Name of the Licence:</strong> CIS recommends naming the licence “Open Data Licence - India” to reflect the nomenclature already established for similar licences in other nations like the UK and Canada. More importantly, the inclusion of the word ‘use’ in the original name “Government Open Data Use License” is misleading, since the licence permits use, sharing, modification and redistribution of open data.<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Change Language on Permissible Use of Data:</strong> The draft licence uses the terms “Access, use, adapt, and redistribute,” which are used in UNESCO’s definition of open educational resources, whereas, under the Indian Copyright Act <strong>[4]</strong>, it should cover “reproduction, issuing of copies,” etc. To resolve this difference, we suggest the following language be used: “Subject to the provisions of section 7, all users are provided a worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive licence to all rights covered by copyright and allied rights, for the duration of existence of such copyright and allied rights over the data or information.”<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Add Section on the Scope of Applicability of the Licence:</strong> It will be useful to inform the user of the licence on its applicability. The section may be drafted as: “This licence is meant for public use, and especially by all Ministries, Departments, Organizations, Agencies, and autonomous bodies of Government of India, when publicly disclosing, either proactively or reactively, data and information created, generated, collected, and managed using public funds provided by Government of India directly or through authorized agencies.”<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Add Sub-Clause Specifying that the Licence is Agnostic of Mode of Access:</strong> As part of the section 4 of the draft licence, titled ‘Terms and Conditions of Use of Data,’ a sub-clause should be added that specifies that users may enjoy all the freedom granted under this licence irrespective of their preferred mode of access of the data concerned, say manually downloaded from the website, automatically accessed via an API, collected from a third party involved in re-sharing of this data, accessed in physical/printed form, etc.<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Add Sub-Clause on Non-Repudiability and Integrity of the Published Data:</strong> To complement the sub-clause 6.e. that notes that data published under this licence should be published permanently and with appropriate versioning (in case of the published data being updated and/or modified), another sub-clause should be added that states that non-repudiability and integrity of published data must be ensured through application of real/digital signature, as applicable, and checksum, as applicable. This is to ensure that an user who has obtained the data, either in physical or digital form, can effectively identify and verify the the agency that has published the data, and if any parts of the data have been lost/modified in the process of distribution and/or transmission (through technological corruption of data, or otherwise).<br /><br /></li>
<li><strong>Combine Section 6 on Exemptions and Section 7 on Termination:</strong> Given that the licence cannot reasonably proscribe access to data that has already been published online, it is suggested that it would be better to simply terminate the application of the licence to that data or information that ought not to have been published for grounds provided under section 8 of the RTI Act, or have been inadvertently published. It should also be noted that section 8 of the RTI Act cannot be “violated” (as stated in Section 6.g. of the draft licence), since it only provides permission for the public authority to withhold information, and does not impose an obligation on them (or anyone else) to do so. The combined clause can read: “Upon determination by the data provider that specific data or information should not have been publicly disclosed for the grounds provided under Section 8 of the Right to Information Act, 2005, the data provider may terminate the applicability of the licence for that data or information, and this termination will have the effect of revocation of all rights provided under Section 3 of this licence.”<br /><br /></li>
<li>It will be our pleasure to discuss these submissions with the Department of Legal Affairs in greater detail, supplement these with further submissions if necessary, and offer any other assistance towards the efforts at developing a national open data licence.</li></ol>
<hr />
<p><strong>[1]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/">http://cis-india.org/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[2]</strong> See: <a href="https://www.mygov.in/sites/default/files/mygov_1466767582190667.pdf">https://www.mygov.in/sites/default/files/mygov_1466767582190667.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[3]</strong> See: <a href="https://www.mygov.in/group-issue/public-consultation-government-open-data-use-license-india/">https://www.mygov.in/group-issue/public-consultation-government-open-data-use-license-india/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[4]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.copyright.gov.in/Documents/CopyrightRules1957.pdf">http://www.copyright.gov.in/Documents/CopyrightRules1957.pdf</a>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/submitted-comments-on-the-government-open-data-use-license-india'>http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/submitted-comments-on-the-government-open-data-use-license-india</a>
</p>
No publishersinhaOpen Government DataOpen LicenseOpen DataNDSAPFeaturedOpennessHomepage2016-07-26T09:23:48ZBlog EntryPublic Consultation for the First Draft of 'Government Open Data Use License - India' Announced
http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/public-consultation-for-the-first-draft-of-government-open-data-use-license-india-announced
<b>The first public draft of the open data license to be used by Government of India was released by the Department of Legal Affairs earlier this week. Comments are invited from general public and stakeholders. These are to be submitted via the MyGov portal by July 25, 2016. CIS was a member of the committee constituted to develop the license concerned, and we contributed substantially to the drafting process.
</b>
<p> </p>
<h4>Please read the call for comments <a class="external-link" href="https://www.mygov.in/group-issue/public-consultation-government-open-data-use-license-india/">here</a>.</h4>
<h4>The PDF version of the draft license document can be accessed <a class="external-link" href="https://www.mygov.in/sites/default/files/mygov_1466767582190667.pdf">here</a>.</h4>
<h4><em>Comments are to be submitted by July 25, 2016.</em></h4>
<hr />
<h4 style="text-align: center;"><strong>Government Open Data Use License - India</strong></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;"><strong>National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy</strong></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;"><strong>Government of India</strong></h4>
<h2>1. Preamble</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Structured data available in open format and open license for public access and use, usually termed as “Open Data,” is of prime importance in the contemporary world. Data also is one of the most valuable resources of modern governance, sharing of which enables various and non-exclusive usages for both commercial and non-commercial purposes. Licenses, however, are crucial to ensure that such data is not misused or misinterpreted (for example, by insisting on proper attribution), and that all users have the same and permanent right to use the data.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The open government data initiative started in India with the notification of the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy (NDSAP), submitted to the Union Cabinet by the Department of Science and Technology, on 17th March 2012 <strong>[1]</strong>. The NDSAP identified the Department of Electronics & Information Technology (DeitY) as the nodal department for the implementation of the policy through National Informatics Centre, while the Department of Science and Technology continues to be the nodal department on policy matters. In pursuance of the Policy, the Open Government Data Platform India <strong>[2]</strong> was launched in 2012.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">While, the appropriate open formats and related aspects for implementation of the Policy has been defined in the “NDSAP Implementation Guidelines” prepared by an inter- ministerial Task Force constituted by the National Informatics Centre <strong>[3]</strong>, the open license for data sets published under NDSAP and through the OGD Platform remained unspecified till now.</p>
<h2>2. Definitions</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">a. <strong>“Data”</strong> means a representation of Information, numerical compilations and observations, documents, facts, maps, images, charts, tables and figures, concepts in digital and/or analog form, and includes metadata <strong>[4]</strong>, that is all information about data, and/or clarificatory notes provided by data provider(s), without which the data concerned cannot be interpreted or used <strong>[5]</strong>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">b. <strong>“Information”</strong> means processed data <strong>[6]</strong>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">c. <strong>“Data Provider(s)”</strong> means person(s) publishing and providing the data under this license.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">d. <strong>“License”</strong> means this document.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">e. <strong>“Licensor”</strong>means any data provider(s) that has the authority to offer the data concerned under the terms of this licence.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">f. <strong>“User”</strong> means natural or legal persons, or body of persons corporate or incorporate, acquiring rights in the data (whether the data is obtained directly from the licensor or otherwise) under this licence.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">g. <strong>“Use”</strong> includes lawful distribution, making copies, adaptation, and all modification and representation of the data, subject to the provisions of this License.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">h. <strong>“Adapt”</strong> means to transform, build upon, or to make any use of the data by itsre-arrangement or alteration <strong>[7]</strong>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">i. <strong>“Redistribute”</strong> means sharing of the data by the user, either in original or in adapted form (including a subset of the original data), accompanied by appropriate attribute statement, under the same or other suitable license.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">j. <strong>“Attribution Statement”</strong> means a standard notice to be published by all users of data published under this license, that contains the details of the provider, source, and license of the data concerned <strong>[8]</strong>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">k. <strong>“Personal Information”</strong> means any Information that relates to a natural person,which, either directly or indirectly, in combination with other Information available or likely to be available with a body corporate, is capable of identifying such person <strong>[9]</strong>.</p>
<h2>3. Permissible Use of Data</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Subject to the conditions listed under section 7, the user may:</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">a. Access, use, adapt, and redistribute data published under this license for all lawful and non-exclusive purposes, without payment of any royalty or fee;</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">b. Apply this license worldwide, and in perpetuity;</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">c. Access, study, copy, share, adapt, publish, redistribute and transmit the data in any medium or format; and</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">d. Use, adapt, and redistribute the data, either in itself, or by combining it with other data, or by including it within a product/application/service, for all commercial and/or non-commercial purposes.</p>
<h2>4. Terms and Conditions of Use of Data</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">a. <strong>Attribution:</strong> The user must acknowledge the provider, source, and license of data by explicitly publishing the attribution statement, including the DOI (Digital Object Identifier), or the URL (Uniform Resource Locator), or the URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) of the data concerned.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">b. <strong>Attribution of Multiple Data:</strong> If the user is using multiple data together and/or listing of sources of multiple data is not possible, the user may provide a link to a separate page/list that includes the attribution statements and specific URL/URI of all data used.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;"> c. <strong>Non-endorsement:</strong> The User must not indicate or suggest in any manner that the data provider(s) endorses their use and/or the user.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">d. <strong>No Warranty:</strong> The data provider(s) are not liable for any errors or omissions, and will not under any circumstances be liable for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, consequential, or other loss, injury or damage caused by its use or otherwise arising in connection with this license or the data, even if specifically advised of the possibility of such loss, injury or damage. Under any circumstances, the user may not hold the data provider(s) responsible for: i) any error, omission or loss of data, and/or ii) any undesirable consequences due to the use of the data as part of an application/product/service (including violation of any prevalent law).</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">e. <strong>Permanent Disclosure and Versioning:</strong> The data provider(s) will ensure that a data package once published under this license will always remain publicly available for reference and use. If an already published data is updated by the provider, then the earlier appropriate version(s) must also be kept publicly available with accordance with the archival policy of the National Informatics Centre.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">f. <strong>Continuity of Provision:</strong>The data provider(s) will strive for continuously updating the data concerned, as new data regarding the same becomes available. However, the data provider(s) do not guarantee the continued supply of updated or up-to-date versions of the data, and will not be held liable in case the continued supply of updated data is not provided.</p>
<h2>5. Template for Attribution Statement</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Unless the user is citing the data using an internationally accepted data citation format <strong>[10]</strong>, an attribution notice in the following format must be explicitly included:</p>
<p>“Data has been published by [Name of Data Provider] and sourced from Open Government Data (OGD) Platform of India: [Name of Data]. ([date of Publication: dd/mm/yyyy]) .[DOI / URL / URI]. Published under Open Government Data License - India: [URL of Open Data License – India].”</p>
<p>For example, “Data has been published by Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation and sourced from Open Government Data (OGD) Platform of India: Overall Balance of Payments. (08/09/2015). <a href="https://data.gov.in/catalog/overall-balance-payments">https://data.gov.in/catalog/overall-balance-payments</a>. Published under Open Government Data License - India: [URL of Open Data License - India].”</p>
<h2>6. Exemptions</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The license does not grant the right to access, use, adapt, and redistribute the following kinds of data:</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">a. Personal information;</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">b. Data that the data provider(s) is not authorised to licence;</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">c. Names, crests, logos and other official symbols of the data provider(s);</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">d. Data subject to other intellectual property rights, including patents, trade-marks and official marks;</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">e. Military insignia;</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">f. Identity documents; and</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">g. Any data publication of which may violate section 8 of the Right to Information Act, 2005 <strong>11</strong>.</p>
<h2>7. Termination</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">a. Failure to comply with stipulated terms and conditions will cause the user’s rights under this license to end automatically.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">b. Where the user’s rights to use data have terminated under the aforementioned clauses or any other Indian law, it reinstates:</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">i. automatically, as of the date the violation is cured, provided it is cured within 30 days of the discovery of the violation; or</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">ii. upon express reinstatement by the Licensor.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">c. For avoidance of doubt, this section does not affect any rights the licensor may have to seek remedies for violation of this license.</p>
<h2>8. Dispute Redressal Mechanism</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify;">This license is governed by Indian law, and the copyright of any data shared under this license vests with the licensor, under the Indian Copyright Act.</p>
<h2>9. Endnotes</h2>
<p><strong>[1]</strong> Ministry of Science and Technology. 2012. National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy (NDSAP) 2012. Gazette of India. March 17. <a href="http://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP.pdf">http://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[2]</strong> See: <a href="https://data.gov.in/">https://data.gov.in/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[3]</strong> See section 3.2 of the Implementation Guidelines for National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy (NDSAP) Version 2.2. <a href="https://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP_Implementation_Guidelines_2.2.pdf">https://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP_Implementation_Guidelines_2.2.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[4]</strong> See section 2.1 of NDSAP 2012.</p>
<p><strong>[5]</strong> See section 2.6 of NDSAP 2012.</p>
<p><strong>[6]</strong> See section 2.7 of NDSAP 2012.</p>
<p><strong>[7]</strong> See section 2 (a) of Indian Copyright Act 1957. <a href="http://copyright.gov.in/Documents/CopyrightRules1957.pdf">http://copyright.gov.in/Documents/CopyrightRules1957.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[8]</strong> The template of the attribution statement is given in section 5 of the license.</p>
<p><strong>[9]</strong> See section 2 (i) of Information Technology (Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules, 2011. <a href="http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/GSR313E_10511%281%29.pdf">http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/GSR313E_10511%281%29.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[10]</strong>For example, those listed in the DOI Citation Formatter tool developed by DataCite, CrossRef and others: <a href="http://crosscite.org/citeproc/">http://crosscite.org/citeproc/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[11]</strong> See: <a href="http://rti.gov.in/webactrti.htm">http://rti.gov.in/webactrti.htm</a>.</p>
<div> </div>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/public-consultation-for-the-first-draft-of-government-open-data-use-license-india-announced'>http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/public-consultation-for-the-first-draft-of-government-open-data-use-license-india-announced</a>
</p>
No publishersinhaOpen Government DataOpen LicenseOpen DataNDSAPFeaturedOpenness2016-06-30T09:41:07ZBlog EntryFree Knowledge and Indian Government Work
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/free-knowledge-and-indian-government-work
<b>Indian Government works are not available under free and open licenses. On the other hand a large number countries such as Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Israel, Macedonia, Mexico, New Zealand, Poland, Serbia, Spain, Taiwan, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Venezuela etc. have adopted the Creative Commons and other free licenses. The works by the US Federal Government automatically go into public domain. This article promotes the idea that the Government works should be freely licensed, wherever possible and applicable.</b>
<h2 align="center">Part 1: Free Knowledge<br /></h2>
<p>Free knowledge movement is a worldwide movement that creates and tries to get works under free and open licenses. It claims that knowledge is a common human property, and must be easily, freely accessible.</p>
<p>While discussing the topic "Access to knowledge: a basic human right", American scientist and researcher Jack Andraka <a class="external-link" href="https://creativecommons.org/2014/01/07/access-to-knowledge-a-basic-human-right/">feels</a>:</p>
<blockquote>Access to knowledge is, you know, a basic human right. Knowledge should not be commoditized; it wants to be free.</blockquote>
<p>The <em>Open Definition</em> defines the term “Open Knowledge” in <em>Open Definition 2.0</em> as:</p>
<blockquote>"Knowledge is open if anyone is free to access, use, modify, and share it — subject, at most, to measures that preserve provenance and openness."</blockquote>
<p> All open content must be a) available under free licenses, b) accessible as a whole, and c) should be in open format (see <a class="external-link" href="http://opendefinition.org/od/2.0/en/">more details</a>)</p>
<p> A big name in the world of free content is (of course) <a class="external-link" href="https://www.wikipedia.org/">Wikipedia</a>, where you can use, share, remix content from the site under the <a class="external-link" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_Creative_Commons_Attribution-ShareAlike_3.0_Unported_License">Creative Commons licenses</a>. There are many organizations, networks and groups working to get more and more content under free and open licenses such as Creative Commons (text, audio, video, image), Free and Open Source Software or FOSS (software), Open design principle (machine, engineering), Open Access (academic works) etc.</p>
<p>Article 26 of the <a class="external-link" href="http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/">Universal Declaration of Human Rights</a> suggests that education should be free. Right to information is also a human right and Article 27 of the declaration states:</p>
<blockquote>(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.<br />(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.</blockquote>
<p>These are just not possible unless knowledge /information is easily and preferably freely accessible to everyone without restrictions. If the first barrier is accessibility, i.e, not having enough digital content or information or content behind paywall, then the second barrier is its openness. Just having access to some web pages is not enough, it also requires rights like free using, sharing, remixing, Unrestricted content can be utilized in the best way.</p>
<hr />
<h2 align="center">Part 2: Indian Government Work<br /></h2>
<p>Indian Government websites are not freely licensed. In section 2(k) of Indian Copyright Act, 1957 the meaning of “Government work” is explained:</p>
<blockquote>"Government work" means a work which is made or published by or under the direction or control of—<br />(i) the Government or any department of the Government;<br />(ii) any Legislature in India;<br /> . . .<br />
<div align="right">Read Indian Copyright Act, section 2(c) <a class="external-link" href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1273687/">here</a>.</div>
</blockquote>
<p> Indian Copyright Act section 17(d) informs about the “First owner of copyright” of a Government work:</p>
<blockquote>in the case of a Government work, Government shall, in the absence of any agreement to the contrary, be the first owner of the copyright therein;<br />
<div align="right">Read section 17(d) <a class="external-link" href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1684400/">here</a>.</div>
</blockquote>
<p> Section 28 is about “Term of copyright in Government works”. It states:</p>
<blockquote>In the case of Government work, where Government is the first owner of the copyright therein, copyright shall subsist until [sixty years] from the beginning of the calendar year next following the year in which the record is first published.—In the case of Government work, where Government is the first owner of the copyright therein, copyright shall subsist until [sixty years] from the beginning of the calendar year next following the year in which the record is first published."<br />
<div align="right">Read section 28 <a class="external-link" href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/176237/">here</a></div>
</blockquote>
<p>
Section 52 of the act allows some “fair use” and informs how content can be used for research, education, review, criticism and some other purpose. The lengthy copyright section may be read <a class="external-link" href="https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1013176/">here</a>. However, it does not make the content free. You are not allowed to remix the work or use for commercial purpose. You can not freely use, modify, distribute it.</p>
<p>Now let’s have a look at a few Government websites and their license details pages.</p>
<h3 align="center">Indian Prime Minister’s official website</h3>
<div align="center">(<a class="external-link" href="http://www.pmindia.gov.in/en/website-policies">http://www.pmindia.gov.in/en/website-policies</a>)</div>
<p>In this website the copyright policy page informs:</p>
<blockquote>Material featured on this website may be reproduced free of charge. However, the material has to be reproduced accurately and not to be used in a derogatory manner or in a misleading context. Wherever the material is being published or issued to others, the source must be prominently acknowledged. However, the permission to reproduce this material shall not extend to any material which is identified as being copyright of a third party. Authorisation to reproduce such material must be obtained from the department/copyright holder concerned.</blockquote>
<p align="left"> A screenshot may be seen below:</p>
<p align="center"><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/PMIndia.jpg/image_large" alt="PMIndia website copyright policy" class="image-inline" title="PMIndia website copyright policy" /></p>
<p> Here-</p>
<ul><li>“Wherever the material is being published or issued to others, the source must be prominently acknowledged.” -- this part of the policy is similar to the Creative Commons licenses, where the owner or author of a work must be given attribution.</li></ul>
but,
<ul><li>“has to be reproduced accurately” -- it prohibits remix or modification works, </li><li>“not to be used in a derogatory manner” -- it is unclear that what is “derogatory manner”! Can it be used for criticism? <br /></li></ul>
<p> </p>
<p align="center"><strong>Indian Vice President’s official website</strong><br />(<a class="external-link" href="http://vicepresidentofindia.nic.in/website-policies">http://vicepresidentofindia.nic.in/website-policies</a>)</p>
<p align="left">This is similar to the Prime Minister’s website policy and does not allow remix, commercial use etc. See screenshot:</p>
<p align="center"><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/VicePresident.jpg/image_large" alt="Indian Vice President website copyright policy" class="image-inline" title="Indian Vice President website copyright policy" /></p>
<div align="center"><strong>Indian President’s official website</strong><br />(<a class="external-link" href="http://presidentofindia.gov.in/copyright-policy.htm">http://presidentofindia.gov.in/copyright-policy.htm</a>)</div>
<p>Although the Vice President’s website allows some fair use, the Indian President’s official web portal’s license is different and does not allow to reproduce the work “partially or fully”. The copyright policy states:</p>
<blockquote>This contents of this website may not be reproduced partially or fully, without due permission from The President of India, If referred to as a part of another publication, the source must be appropriately acknowledged. The contents of this website can not be used in any misleading or objectionable context.</blockquote>
<p align="center"><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/President.jpg/image_preview" alt="Indian President website copyright policy" class="image-inline" title="Indian President website copyright policy" /></p>
<p>We have shown 3 example above, but it is more or less similar in all government web portals.</p>
<p> </p>
<hr />
<h2 align="center">Part 3: Government works <span class="st">— Worldwide<br /></span></h2>
<p>It might be interesting to note that unlike India, a large number of countries publish their Government works under open licenses or public domain. We’ll discuss only a few here:</p>
<h3 align="center">United States</h3>
<ul><li>The works by the US Federal Government automatically go into public domain. </li><li>The <a class="external-link" href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/copyright">White House website</a> and third party content such as text or speeches by the first lady are licensed under CC SA 3.0 US license. U.S. </li><li>On 18 June, 2013, Barack Obama and other G7 leaders endorsed the Open Data Charter. Open Data Action plan is licensed under CC0.</li><li>Several other works such as works created by New York State Senate, works created by the State of Virginia are also under different creative commons licenses. Details may be seen <a class="external-link" href="https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/Government_use_of_Creative_Commons#United_States">here</a>.</li></ul>
<h3 align="center">United Kingdom</h3>
<p> In the United Kingdom, Open Government License (OGL) is used for Crown Copyright works published by the UK government. Since 2001, some works by the UK government were available under the Click-Use license. This license was replaced by OGL in 2010. The first version of OGL was released on 30 September 2010. OGL is compatible with the CC licenses. OGL allows to:</p>
<ul><li>copy, publish, distribute and transmit the Information, </li><li>adapt the Information, </li><li>exploit the Information commercially and non-commercially for example, by combining it with other Information, or by including it in your own product or application.</li></ul>
<p>However,</p>
<ul><li>Attribution must be given to with source link, which is similar to the creative commons licenses.</li><li>Some documents such as the British passport, military insignia, property rights, including patents, trademarks, and design rights, personal information in data don’t come under OGL.</li></ul>
<p>More about the Open Government License may be seen <a class="external-link" href="http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/2/">here</a>.</p>
<h3 align="center">France<br /></h3>
<ul><li>France government’s website<a class="external-link" href="http://www.gouvernement.fr/"> http://www.gouvernement.fr/</a> is licensed under the CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 FR license. The English version of the policy page may be seen <a class="external-link" href="http://www.gouvernement.fr/en/terms-and-conditions">here</a>.</li><li>France government’s cultural department’s website <a class="external-link" href="http://www.culture.fr/">http://www.culture.fr/</a> is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 FR.</li><li>The Culture Communication website <a class="external-link" href="http://www.culturecommunication.gouv.fr/">http://www.culturecommunication.gouv.fr/</a> is also licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 FR.</li></ul>
<h3 align="center">Russian Federation</h3>
<ul><li>Content of the website <a class="external-link" href="http://kremlin.ru">http://kremlin.ru</a> are under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. License policy page may be seen <a class="external-link" href="http://en.kremlin.ru/about/copyrights">here</a>. Many other Russian government works are under different open licenses, details may be seen <a class="external-link" href="https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/Government_use_of_Creative_Commons#Russian_Federation">here</a>.</li></ul>
<h3 align="center">Netherlands</h3>
<ul><li> The Dutch government official website<a class="external-link" href="http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/"> http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/</a> is licensed under CC 0. All content of this website is under public domain, unless any other license is specified.</li></ul>
<h3 align="center">Bulgaria</h3>
<ul><li>
The President of Bulgaria’s official website <a class="external-link" href="https://www.president.bg/">https://www.president.bg/</a> is licensed under CC BY ND 2.5 Bulgaria.
</li></ul>
<h3 align="center">Croatia</h3>
<ul><li>
Croatian Government website <a class="external-link" href="http://otvorenikod.nsk.hr/">http://otvorenikod.nsk.hr/</a> is licensed under CC BY SA 3.0 Croatia.
</li></ul>
<p> </p>
<h2 align="center"><strong>The Long list<br /></strong></h2>
<span class="visualHighlight">More than 30 countries have adopted and publishing their works under the Creative Commons and other free licenses. Other the above mentioned countries, the list include countries like Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, Georgia, Greece, Guatemala, Israel, Macedonia, Mexico, New Zealand, Poland, Serbia, Spain, Taiwan, Ukraine, Venezuela etc. Other than the counties, several international organizations such as the World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) endorsed the free license concept and have adopted the same. See a long list of countries using free licenses <strong><a class="external-link" href="https://wiki.creativecommons.org/wiki/Government_use_of_Creative_Commons">here</a></strong>.</span>
<p> </p>
<h2 align="center">Last line</h2>
<p>It is unfortunate that the Indian Government works are not under free licenses, however it would be great if the Government rethinks and relicense their general content under the free licenses. This will help not only the movement, but the content itself can be utilized in a much better and broader way.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/free-knowledge-and-indian-government-work'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/free-knowledge-and-indian-government-work</a>
</p>
No publishertitofreedominfebWikipediaOpen LicenseAccess to Knowledge2017-06-28T10:02:00ZBlog EntryCIS Signs MoU with Odia Virtual Academy
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/cis-signs-mou-with-odia-virtual-academy
<b>On October 26, 2018, the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Odia Virtual Academy (OVA) to work on drafting an open content policy for the state, to promote use of Wikimedia projects by various user types and to ensure sustainability of Wikimedia projects, and to facilitate development of relevant free and open source software projects. This partnership between OVA and CIS will be carried out from December 2018 to November 2019, and we are sharing an overview of the activities and their objectives in this post.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The internet is increasingly significant as a knowledge repository today. Especially relevant in this context is the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, which contains information on almost every topic under the sun, across many languages spoken globally, and is used extensively all people to seek information and produce knowledge.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">From past one year (since July 2017), The Government of Odisha has been actively participating in the open knowledge movement by publishing the content of their seven websites and eight social media accounts under Creative Commons 4.0 International license. This active collaboration with Government of Odisha and an active Odia Wikimedia community seeking to create and distribute knowledge in Odia language over the internet has resulted in improving 1,200 articles on different Wikimedia projects, and together has received a near about 16 Million page views. Further, the Government of Odisha adopting an open content policy will provide a significant boost in institutionalising creation, sharing, and re-use of open knowledge resources - including government documents, official statistics, open educational resources, and open cultural resources - in Odia language.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://ova.gov.in/en/" target="_blank">Odia Virtual Academy (OVA)</a> is an organisation established by Government of Odisha for development, promotion and popularization of Odia language, literature, and lexicography for general use. It is an organised initiative to encourage expeditious evolution and popularisation of Odia books, magazines, journals, old songs, manuscripts, assembly speeches, and archival records by digitising and providing internet based resources and opportunities for all odia people living across the globe.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">On October 26, 2018, the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) signed a MoU with the Odia Virtual Academy to work on drafting an open content policy for the state, to promote use of Wikimedia projects by various user types and to ensure sustainability of Wikimedia projects, and to facilitate development of relevant free and open source software projects.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">This partnership between OVA and CIS will be carried out from December 2018 to November 2019, and its activities are structured by the following objectives:</p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><b>Open Content Policy for the Government of Odisha:</b> The open content policy will include guidelines for the use of open licenses and open standards to enable the resource (text, resources or otherwise) publishing entity to share resources in a manner that it can be easily and freely be accessed, shared, and re-used by entities, without asking for prior permission, while ensuring that full attribution to the creator/publisher is provided and the resources are not misused, or the creator/publisher is not misrepresented in the process.<br /><br /></li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><b>Developing Digital and Open Knowledge Resources in Odia Language:</b> The CIS team will undertake awareness-building, training, and outreach activities to develop Odia language content on Wikimedia ecosystem, as well as to enable content creators from across institutions, with a focus on state government officials at district headquarters and college students. The broad mandate of the digital resource generation workshop is to introduce teachers, students, and interested citizens to tools of collaborative knowledge production on the internet and methods for generating new online content or reintroduce offline content in Odia language.<br /><br /></li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><b>‘Revive Odia’ Activities:</b> Odia as a language has a long tradition and has been medium of expression for the native speakers of Odisha. While Odia as a language of communication is not under any immediate threat, its role and responsibility as a language of Knowledge needs to be examined carefully. ‘Revive Odia’ activities have a simple objective: <i>To bring Odia under limelight in the digital domain</i>. Wikimedia projects in Odia language are working actively to increase the presence of Odia language on the Internet. If such projects can be supported new projects can be incubated, Odia will emerge as the language of knowledge production and distribution as well.<br /><br /></li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><b>GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums) Partnerships:</b> Wikimedia ecosystem offer several platforms for using the power and opportunities of internet to (digitally) preserve, enable access to, and creative re-use of historical, cultural, and social artefacts, and channel the expertise of local populations to build narratives around these artefacts. The CIS team is particularly interested in initiating engagement with public GLAM institutions at various locations and levels, and work with academic and research community to build scientific metadata of these objects. The metadata will be used to represent the tangible and intangible cultural heritage of Odisha in projects such as Wikidata.<br /><br /></li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><b>Building and Supporting FOSS for Odia Language:</b> To promote and enable usage of Odia language on the web, the CIS team will facilitate development of an Odia font, an input tool, and a spell-check dictionary - all of which will be released as FOSS (Free and Open Source Software) resources.</li>
</ul>
<p>To undertake these activities, CIS will receive a grant of Rs 20,00,000 (~$28,000) from OVA.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/cis-signs-mou-with-odia-virtual-academy'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/cis-signs-mou-with-odia-virtual-academy</a>
</p>
No publishersaileshOpen Educational ResourcesCIS-A2KOpen LicenseAccess to KnowledgeOpen DataWikipediaOpen ContentOdia WikipediaOpen AccessWikimedia2018-12-20T00:24:44ZBlog EntryA Shortcut to Freedom
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/a-shortcut-to-freedom
<b>In our everyday life we need access to knowledge and information, we need books (and magazines, newspapers), movies (and documentaries, animations), music for education and entertainment purposes. Now, a delighting fact is almost everything we need, from a 1965 book to the latest Bollywood movie’s MP3 song, is available on the web. You knock the door, and it opens. Why should we care for free knowledge then? We have a got “a shortcut to freedom”. </b>
<p><strong>Scenario 1</strong><br />Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalaithaa died on 5 December 2016. Kamlesh, a college student from Chennai wants to post a few photos of the leader on his Facebook wall and page paying his tribute to her. He quickly searches on Google, finds a few photos, and posts on the wall. <br /><br /><strong>Scenario 2</strong><br />Nilima, a young girl from Mumbai, wants to use a latest Bollywood movie song as her mobile ringtone. She too searches on Google, and quickly finds the movie song with many options such as 64 kbps, 128 kbps, remix, reprise and a few issues such as misleading download buttons, pop-up advertisement windows etc. She selects one and puts it as her mobile ringtone.</p>
<p><strong>Scenario 2a</strong><br />A few days later, Madhuri, a friend of Nilima finds her mobile ringtone. Madhuri requests Nilima to send a copy of the music piece, and Nilima sends it over her mobile bluetooth.<br /><br /><strong>Scenario 3</strong><br />Lokesh Sanyal, a school teacher from Darjeeling, West Bengal, needs a book for his studies. He first goes to his local library and also asks his friends, but fails to get a copy of the book. Now, before buying a copy of the book, he thinks to check the world wide web to see if a free PDF copy the book is available, and hurrah!, he gets the book from Torrents or some other site.<br /><br /><strong>We have almost everything we require. . . </strong><br />If we make a list of our requirements of content such as movies, music, books, magazines, games, softwares, we’ll find almost everything is available on the web. You just need spend some time, (be careful about malicious web pages and downloads) and you will get what you want. It might be the movie released just a week ago, or a book published in 1990. It might a photograph of your favorite actress, or music piece of Amzad Ali Khan. Whatever we want, we get.</p>
<p><strong>. . . but</strong><br />Let’s ponder upon these questions:</p>
<ol><li>Are you using a Windows operating system in your laptop or computer? Is the copy of the Windows OS original (if you are unsure about it then did you buy a copy of the OS with registration key or installed from a CD or pendrive given by someone freely)?</li><li>How many (hundred) times you have downloaded images, videos, music, games from the web without checking or knowing its license details?</li><li>Do you know that everytime you are sharing some music or video over your mobile bluetooth, there is a possibility that you are violating some copyright and which might be punishable?</li></ol>
<p>The World Wide Web is not free. You get content, but with those come a large number of restrictions. Knowingly or unknowingly we violate copyright everyday. So what should we do?</p>
<ol><li>Of course we have a shortcut — illegal downloading, piracy, as we know that no one really cares. We can ignore everything and carry on. <br /></li><li>Or, there is a second option, join the <a class="external-link" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_knowledge">free and open knowledge movement</a> and try to get more and more content under the <a class="external-link" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_license#Classification_and_licenses">free licenses</a>. <br /></li></ol>
<p>One option is easy, needs no hard work, on the other hand the second option is difficult to follow, needs a lot of hard work, although that should be the process. It’s completely upto you that which option would you prefer.</p>
<h2>See also</h2>
<ul><li><a class="external-link" href="http://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/free-knowledge-and-indian-government-work">Free Knowledge and Indian Government work</a><br /></li></ul>
<h2>Image credit</h2>
<ul><li>Source: <a class="external-link" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Red_and_blue_pill.jpg">WIkimedia Commons</a>, Author: <a class="external-link" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:W.carter">W.carter</a>, License: CC SA 4.0 International<br /></li></ul>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/a-shortcut-to-freedom'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/a-shortcut-to-freedom</a>
</p>
No publishertitofreedominfebOpen LicenseAccess to Knowledge2017-06-28T09:58:47ZBlog Entry