Thursday 30 September 2010

TNA - new Open Government License announced for information re-use

The National Archives has announced a new Open Government License for the use of its information. From the site's news page:

The National Archives is today launching a new Open Government Licence, which makes it faster and easier than ever before to re-use public sector information.

The UK Open Government Licence is a key element of the Government's commitment to greater transparency. It provides a single set of terms and conditions for anyone wishing to use or license government information and removes some of the existing barriers to re-use.

Developers and entrepreneurs wishing to use government data to create new websites and applications will no longer need to register or formally apply for permission to re-use the data. The new licence is interoperable with other internationally recognised licensing models, such as Creative Commons.

Commenting on the launch of the new licence, Lord McNally, Minister for The National Archives and Public Sector Information, said: 'The National Archives isn't simply a repository of our nation's history, its task is to bring information to life, make it accessible and enable its re-use. This innovative licence gives everyone the opportunity to create products and services which benefit society.'

The licence covers a broad range of public sector information, including Crown Copyright, databases and source codes and can be used across the entire public sector. It is published today in a machine-readable format on the Information management section of The National Archives website.

To support the UK Open Government Licence, The National Archives has developed the UK Government Licensing Framework which sets out the Government's overall policy on licensing and the re-use of public sector information.


From TNA's license document at http://ht.ly/2Mat1

You are free to:

copy, publish, distribute and transmit the Infomation;
adapt the Information;
exploit the Information commercially for example, by combining it with other Information, or by including it in your own product or application.

You must, where you do any of the above:
acknowledge the source of the Information by including any attribution statement specified by the Information Provider(s) and, where possible, provide a link to this licence;
If the Information Provider does not provide a specific attribution statement, or if you are using Information from several Information Providers and multiple attributions are not practical in your product or application, you may consider using the following:

Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v1.0.

ensure that you do not use the Information in a way that suggests any official status or that the Information Provider endorses you or your use of the Information;
ensure that you do not mislead others or misrepresent the Information or its source;
ensure that your use of the Information does not breach the Data Protection Act 1998 or the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003.
These are important conditions of this licence and if you fail to comply with them the rights granted to you under this licence, or any similar licence granted by the Licensor, will end automatically.

Exemptions

This licence does not cover the use of:

•personal data in the Information;
•Information that has neither been published nor disclosed under information access legislation (including the Freedom of Information Acts for the UK and Scotland) by or with the consent of the Information Provider;
•departmental or public sector organisation logos, crests and the Royal Arms except where they form an integral part of a document or dataset;
•military insignia;
•third party rights the Information Provider is not authorised to license;
•Information subject to other intellectual property rights, including patents, trademarks, and design rights; and
•identity documents such as the British Passport.

More on the subject at TNA's dedicated page at http://ht.ly/2Mat1

Chris

www.ScotlandsGreatestStory.co.uk
Professional genealogical problem solving and research
http://twitter.com/ChrisMPaton
Researching Scottish Family History (New book)

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