Physical ownership should be distinguished from copyright ownership. If I write a letter to you, then copyright remains mine, but physical ownership is yours - so, for example, I cannot insist that you return the letter to me, but I can insist that you don't make multiple copies of it. So the author does not "retain ownership". s50 does not mean copyright is suspended, rather there is no infringement if a copy is made under the requirements of another enactment. Copyright in the document remains with the copyright owner. A letter sent from one individual to another does not necessarily come within the terms of the Data Protection Act - to so so, it must come under the definition of "personal data", e.g., it must be organised in such a way that the contents can be easily retrieved. I'm no expert on confidential information, but I suspect in order for the contents of a letter to be deemed confidential, it must be marked "confidential" or similar. I do know that a letter that contains only trivial or vague information, information that is in the public domain or information that is obvious cannot be protected as confidential, nor can a letter where there is no pre-existing relationship between sender and recipient - so if I send a letter to a stranger revealing in the letter something that would under other circumstances be considered confidential, the stranger has no duty to respect that. All in all, things are rather messier than they first appear. Charles PS If the sculpture is in a permanent public place, such as a park or outside a building, it does not enjoy copyright and so the photographer is free to photograph it. If it is not on permanent public display, then the photographer has infringed the sculptor's copyright. The person who photographs the photograph is almost certainly infringing the copyright of the photographer and possibly is infringing the copyright of the sculptor (if it wasn't on permanent public display originally). Professor Charles Oppenheim Department of Information Science Loughborough University Loughborough Leics LE11 3TU Tel 01509-223065 Fax 01509-223053 e mail [log in to unmask] ----- Original Message ----- From: "Graeme Hawley" <[log in to unmask]> To: <[log in to unmask]> Sent: Friday, February 11, 2005 2:56 PM Subject: Ownership of letters Hello again, and thanks for all of the helpful replies. My understanding of this is now as follows: · My public authority holds letters, some being copies of letters sent to a well known public figure, some being letters received from that public figure. · The author of a letter retains their ownership and copyright of the content. · The recipient of the letter owns the document, in the same way that a person who buys a book owns the book, but not the copyright. · Section 50 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act allows for copyright to be suspended to allow the release of information under the terms of another Act of Parliament. · Notwithstanding the above, there is a clear Data Protection element involved in this request, and it is my understanding that a letter sent by a private individual to another private individual contains an implicit understanding of confidentiality. · Therefore, releasing the private correspondence of another person may breech the terms of the Data Protection Act. I have contacted the author of the original correspondence to see if they have any objection to the disclosure of the exchanges (content is pretty anodyne). If the person refuses to allow their correspondence to be disclosed: a) Am I allowed to release the letters that my public authority was the author of, or would this indirectly violate the other person's DP rights in the chain of correspondence? b) Can the applicant request to see the correspndance that took place about access to the correspondence? I'm worried that I am going to worry about this all weekend. Some interesting links regarding the ownership of letters / email: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/3204121.stm http://www.duanemorris.com/articles/article1667.html http://www.strom.com/pubwork/iwwoe94.html While we're on this subject - a jolly Friday afternoon teaser: A sculptor creates a work of art. A photographer takes a picture of the sculpture and displays it in an exhibition of their photographic artwork. A visitor to the exhibition takes a photograph of the photograph, and puts it in his own exhibition. Who, if anyone, has had their intellectual property rights violated? Cheers, Graeme. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ All archives of messages are stored permanently and are available to the world wide web community at large at http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/data-protection.html If you wish to leave this list please send the command leave data-protection to [log in to unmask] All user commands can be found at : - http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/help/commandref.htm Any queries about sending or receiving message please send to the list owner [log in to unmask] (all commands go to [log in to unmask] not the list please) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ All archives of messages are stored permanently and are available to the world wide web community at large at http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/data-protection.html If you wish to leave this list please send the command leave data-protection to [log in to unmask] All user commands can be found at : - http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/help/commandref.htm Any queries about sending or receiving message please send to the list owner [log in to unmask] (all commands go to [log in to unmask] not the list please) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^