Morning everyone,

Ahh yes the joys of FoI and EIR regulations! As with everyone our charging
policies with regard to provision of data only is available via our
Corporate Publication Scheme, and I certainly agree that the underlying
data is covered by the current legislation.

But the catch for us is that we don't provide a straight off download to
consultants etc as we add/update/valid the data where possible before it
goes out (and often that is accompanied by management advice etc as well),
so there is more going on than merely passing out data (except when it's
just going to the public). It's this catch that we have to deal with before
we can add the download facility for everyone. I'll let you know how it
develops anyway!

Just on another note with the bounding polygon, they won't be ready until
the final maritime boundaries are agreed for the offshore data, once that
one is sorted out then I'll add them to the website.

Maybe we should have stuck with paper records, they seemed so much
simpler....!!

cheers
Bruce

Bruce Mann MA MIFA FSA Scot
Archaeologist
Archaeology Service
Aberdeenshire, Moray & Angus Councils

Tel: (01224) 664731
Fax: (01224) 664679

Any "TR" attachments with this email are for Aberdeenshire Council TRIM
users only.


                                                                                                                                      
  From:       Thomas Rees <[log in to unmask]>                                                                           
                                                                                                                                      
  To:         [log in to unmask]                                                                                                 
                                                                                                                                      
  Date:       29/09/2010 09:26                                                                                                        
                                                                                                                                      
  Subject:    Re: Revised Aberdeenshire, Moray & Angus HERs launched online                                                           
                                                                                                                                      





Bruce

Glad you like the idea of a bounding polygon, given the antiquarian nature
of some of our data I think there will never be the ability for an SMR/HER
to hold spatial data that solely falls within their authorities boundary -
but good to show what are you are trying to be definitive about.

Glad you are thinking of a download facility in the future. On charging and
copyright for downloads, I appreciate this is a complex area with competing
interpretations. My personal stance would be that in Scotland the
underlying data is all covered by EIR regs, and if not then by FOI regs,
and the issue is whether you facilitate easy access to this data or add
charges for digital download. The combination of FOI and EIR means to me
that any charge, other than for time in extracting data, would be
challengeable. Further that while charge levels are not defined under EIR,
the Scottish Information Commissioner has consistently required charge
levels to be comparable to those defined under FOI (say £15 per hour?).

On copyright, again the Scottish Information Commissioner has made a couple
of judgments and statements on this - perhaps most relevant was:

Q. I've been asked to release information which is third party copyright.
Can I release the information without breaching the Copyright Act?

A. From 1st January 2005, public authorities in Scotland are able to
release information which is third party copyright in response to a FOI
request without breaching the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
(CDPA) as a result of The Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002
(Consequential Modifications) Order 2004 which was made by the UK
Parliament.
Among other things, this Order ensures that section 50 of the CDPA applies
to FOISA. Section 50 of the CDPA states that if a particular 'act' (e.g.
the release of information in response to an FOI request) is required by an
Act of Parliament then the carrying out of that act does not infringe
copyright.
This means you will be able to respond to requests for information under
FOISA without breaching copyright. However, the usual copyright
restrictions will apply to the subsequent use of the information by the
applicant.

Again a personal perspective but restricting access under copyright would
also be challengeable, though making clear the copyright restrictions on
subsequent use would be appropriate. Of course releasing copyright for
materials under your copyright in the SMR/HER for a commercial end use
would not be covered by EIR and FOI and hence unrestricted charges for this
would be possible.

As ever a complex web.

Cheers

Tom







Thomas Rees
Director & Consultant Archaeologist
MA (Hons), MIFA, FSA Scot



Rathmell Archaeology Limited, Unit 8 Ashgrove Workshops, Kilwinning,
Ayrshire KA13 6PU

t. +44(0)1294 542848; f. +44(0)1294 542849; m. +44(0)7817 334907;
www.rathmell-arch.co.uk

Rathmell Archaeology Limited registered in Edinburgh No 244370 Registered
Office: 8 Underwood, Kilwinning, Ayrshire KA13 7HR

-----Original Message-----
From: Issues related to Historic Environment Records [
mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bruce Mann
Sent: 28 September 2010 15:01
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Revised Aberdeenshire, Moray & Angus HERs launched online

Hi Tom,

Many thanks for the feedback. We did do a data cleanse a couple of years
back to strip out all points and polygons that are definitely within the
Dundee City boundary, but as you suspect there are a few remaining simply
because of the lack of clearer location details (findspots for instance
that occur somewhere within this area etc etc).

Your idea of providing data boundary files is a good one and I'll look into
this as it should be quiet straight forward to do. We could add it to the
open data section of the Council website as this is getting upgraded anyway
in preperation for various other policy developments/INSPIRE etc.

As for providing downloads, this is built into our in-house view of things
but is currently switched off for public users. We would love to be able to
open up access to this facility, particularily for the Contracting Units,
but we still need to understand how this will affect charging mechanisms,
copyright etc. But if no-one manages to break what we have online at the
moment then we'll push this second phase of development next year.

Many thanks again!

cheers
Bruce

Bruce Mann
Archaeologist
Aberdeenshire, Moray & Angus Councils




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