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[cos918]

Ok Here is a question.
I get a hold of a plan. I wack it under the photo copier and sell them on for money  . Ok that's breaking copyright laws. What happens if I redraw the plans my self either by computer or by hand and then sell them on for money is this breaking the law. 

john

[dreadnought72]

... the museums appear to be singing from the same 'hym sheet' in their desperate efforts to raise cash in this economic climate.

The really annoying thing is that we (the tax payer) have bought these plans already. I don't object to a handling/photocopying charge for a set, nor to realistic handling costs, but £'00s from the Maritime Museum for some juicy ships is way out of my price range: there must be hundreds of ships we'll never see built as models due to this barrier.

(Thinking of a pile of WW1 ships, beyond the "typical" Dreadnought, Invicible, etc.)

Andy

[Colin Bishop]

I get a hold of a plan. I wack it under the photo copier and sell them on for money  . Ok that's breaking copyright laws. What happens if I redraw the plans my self either by computer or by hand and then sell them on for money is this breaking the law. 

That's just another way of copying so what's the difference?

[mersey dave]

What would the possibility be of having a library within the forum so that we can all add plans in order to assist members in there research. What's your views on this. 

Regards Dave.

[cos918]

That's just another way of copying so what's the difference?

Is It Copying . Look at the more popular boats there are loads of diffrent plans around drawn by diffrent people of the same boat. Are the new plans a breach of copyright? I thought when you redrew some think it came your own work.

John

[Colin Bishop]

Before photocopying was invented then physical copying was the way they did things. Yes, there are differerent versions of plans of the same vessels available but in the main they would have been independently drawn from research material and will probably vary in their style, detailed content, scale etc. So you could get an original set of builder's plans of the Queen Mary (full size of course!) and draw your own version for model making purposes and sell that.

When model making plans of existing ships are drawn up it is usually customary to seek agreement from the owners/builders. If the subject is an older vessel with historical plans held by museums then there is unlikely to be a problem if you use the museum plans as a reference source to draw up a set of modelmaker plans. If you simply copied the museum plans and tried to sell them it would be a different story.

For my recent article on the new Isle of Wight ferries in Model Boats, Wightlink gave me permission for their general arrangement drawings to be reproduced in the magazine. That doesn't give either me or the magazine the right to reproduce them for sale.

Colin

[allnightin]

Photos are generally 75 years copyright and if still making a profit it could last longer

According to the flowchart that Perkasaman gave the link to on the Museums Copyright Group web site, a photo has copyright for 70 years.  It is not for the museum to decide when the copyright ceases so I read that as meaning that WW2 photos that precede September 1940 are now out of copyright - such as from the start of the Battle of Britain for example.  Anyone want to take that up with the NMM or IWM?

[allnightin]

If the subject is an older vessel with historical plans held by museums then there is unlikely to be a problem if you use the museum plans as a reference source to draw up a set of modelmaker plans. If you simply copied the museum plans and tried to sell them it would be a different story.

For my recent article on the new Isle of Wight ferries in Model Boats, Wightlink gave me permission for their general arrangement drawings to be reproduced in the magazine. That doesn't give either me or the magazine the right to reproduce them for sale.

Colin

Colin,

While I can understand how copyright is affected in your Wightlink example, for older examples - say a 18th century frigate drawings at the National Maritime Museum - surely there are no longer any copyright issues?

Francis Macnaughton

[FullLeatherJacket]

To my mind the issue isn't that of simply copying  a drawing (which itself is probably not illegal); it's the act of selling  those copies (which may well be illegal) that's the deciding point here. No need to make the matter even more complicated than it actually is.
FLJ

[mersey dave]

What would the possibility be of having a library within the forum so that we can all add plans in order to assist members in there research. What's your views on this. 

Regards Dave.

[malcolmfrary]

What would the possibility be of having a library within the forum so that we can all add plans in order to assist members in there research. What's your views on this. 

Regards Dave.

As long as the contributor has full claim to the drawings, and no intention of claiming any future benefit from them. The only problem down the line is a future entrepreneur selling them on for his own profit.  Any actions arising would leave mayhem as the piggy in the middle.  There are plenty of sites with plans that are legally and legitimately freely available for personal use.  All of the drawings carry their authors mark, and any commercial use without appropriate permission (usually by crossing of palms with sufficient silver) would be actionable.

[Colin Bishop]

Francis,

If you look at the National Maritime Museum Website they have very stringent terms and conditions concerning reproduction of the images displayed there which include reproduction of quite a few plans. There is a lot of mention of 'Crown Copyright' and some interesting comments about third part copyright in respect of items held by the Museum. I would imagine that the situation can be quite complex depending upon the provenance of the material. However, on the one hand if you simply use the material as a source of reference to produce your own set of plans I doubt if there would be a problem. The producers of Nelson era kits use NMM plans as a basis for developing thir CAD drawings. On the other hand, if you were to buy a set of plans from the NMM, take them down to the local copy shop and sell them on Ebay then I suspect you might have your collar felt under one law or another!

Still, it is open to any of the proponents of universal freedom to actually try it and see what happens......

Colin

[steamboatmodel]

I remember 'Les Chiffons' Colin    
(Before any other cleverclogs takes credit, or plagiarises it, ............... MHS could hire the top half of a numerate (both metric and imperial )and dextrous  humanoid to provide a 'bespoke' plan service which supplies and despatches plans copied at a scale requested/decided  by the customer. This propensity could potentially save customers a lot of grief/hassle and additional expense, many of whom, don't have easy access to copyshops. A potential 'win' situation for all concerned.
A skilled operative on a modern plan copy machine can soon  calculate/measure 'enlargement/reduction %foibles' on the said machine and rapidly correct/adjust the extrapolated  innacuracies evident on some 'originals' which are often annoyingly, either under/oversized and produce accurate copies at alternative scales.
A new plan service   ' U SCALE' @'TRU SCALE' (My copyright*)
 * A herd of my  legal eagles are now standing by to negotiate my world patent rights and franchising.
(Hi Allnightin, the museums appear to be singing from the same 'hym sheet' in their desperate efforts to raise cash in this economic climate. Here's a link which refers in part to your questions about photographs and the duration of copyright:
http://www.museumscopyright.org.uk/private.pdf       .............................   (Is this earner 'tapping the admiral?' )

For those of us not in the UK  'bespoke' translates to "Tailor made"
What I would like to see is all the old magazines and plans digitized so that reprints could be made.
Regards,
Gerald.

[allanb131]

I found this interpretation of the law in the UK with regard to "fair use" and thought it might be of interest.



FAIR USE - Fair use is a limitation on the exclusive rights of the copyright owner; in other words, it allows reasonable public access to copyrighted works.
The idea is an important part of the English common-law tradition.
Why does FAIR USE exist?
FAIR USE allows people to use images and written works without compensating the original writer/creator, as long as they act in good faith and do not profit from reproducing the work.  Education, parody, criticism, news reporting, etc are all examples of fair use.
The idea of FAIR USE has guided the use of reproductions of works for years.  In most cases, the lack of commercial gain is necessary for a claim of fair use.  If you are a non-profit website designed for educational purposes, you are in the perfect position to claim FAIR USE of images which are already in the PUBLIC DOMAIN.
________________________________________
For a long time, the FAIR USE doctrine occupied a grey area of law, usually decided on a case-by-case basis.  Typically, if someone were profiting from another person's work which was not in the PUBLIC DOMAIN, it was not considered fair use.  Museums typically did not sue non-profit websites which reproduced images for educational purposes.  If they had, the court would have forced them to prove a substantial loss of profit from the use.  Understandably, such proof would not exist and the court would not look favorably upon such a vindictive case, particularly since the images were already in the public domain.


Regards Allan.

[Colin Bishop]

What I would like to see is all the old magazines and plans digitized so that reprints could be made.

Not economically viable I'm afraid. Just for Model Boats alone there would be over 700 issues with around 50,000 pages. That's maybe 12,000 articles, many of which, such as old regatta reports, would be of no interest today. Of the balance how many would you sell? If you are just taking photocopies you would need to index them, a huge job in itself. If you OCR the articles the workload would be even greater. How do I know this? Well, I did go through all 700 issues when compiling a tiny fraction for inclusion in the recent Model Boats Commemorative Special.

Yup, there is indeed gold in them thar hills but it needs a hell of a lot of mining. There may be another Special next year with a further selection of 'oldies' but it will involve a lot of work and still only scratch the surface of what is available. And that will be my interpretaion of what is of interest to modellers, everyone will have their own take on it.

Colin

[John W E]

Very interesting and educational topic this one is turning out to be.  

Here are a few other thoughts to put in the 'melting pot'.   How large is the model boat fraternity - there arent many manufacturers solely catering for the model boater.  We can count the manufacturers on one hand.   They have to try and make a living from selling various goods - to fulfil our needs.  We begin making copies of whatever they produce and it will soon put them out of business and then we lose them for good.

Does PSships spring to mind?

How many draughtsmen actually sit down and draw out model boat lines for us?   Not many are there?   They have to make a living.   They sell their plans direct to ourselves, myhobbiestore, marine modelling etc. and they have to make a profit too to keep them in business to produce their magazines etc., So....just think about it, take their business away and we lose them too.

I am not against lending any plans which I have done and also given plans to be copied, used to build something - but not for resale.    I have crossed swords with certain folk on ebay who have sold copied plans; and at one extent it did backfire on me - but it doesnt half nark me when I see plans like FLJ's, and Glyn Guest's plans etc., for sale for £6-£7 - if a person wants plans like that all theyhave to do is come onto this forum and ask and surely someone will offer them plans on loan/gift of plans.

aye
Just my thoughts....

john

[malcolmfrary]

Not economically viable I'm afraid. Just for Model Boats alone there would be over 700 issues with around 50,000 pages. That's maybe 12,000 articles, many of which, such as old regatta reports, would be of no interest today.

I'm just wondering how much effort went into this-

http://books.google.com/books?id=kSoDAAAAMBAJ

Granted, there is probably a much bigger base of interest, and if it was sponsored by google, who probably own about a quarter of the cash in the world....

[The long Build]

Not economically viable I'm afraid. Just for Model Boats alone there would be over 700 issues with around 50,000 pages. That's maybe 12,000 articles, many of which, such as old regatta reports, would be of no interest today. Of the balance how many would you sell? If you are just taking photocopies you would need to index them, a huge job in itself. If you OCR the articles the workload would be even greater. How do I know this? Well, I did go through all 700 issues when compiling a tiny fraction for inclusion in the recent Model Boats Commemorative Special.

Yup, there is indeed gold in them thar hills but it needs a hell of a lot of mining. There may be another Special next year with a further selection of 'oldies' but it will involve a lot of work and still only scratch the surface of what is available. And that will be my interpretaion of what is of interest to modellers, everyone will have their own take on it.

Colin

Would be nice though., just think out of 4767 members if each active and able (ie scanner etc) could scan a couple of copys it would soon be done. These scans then passed onto MB / MHS (members on the forum could have access) and then the worlds your oyster...I know its unlikely to ever happen but then they say we landed on the moon once   so you never know.

[Colin Bishop]

Almost anything is possible, but probable - well....

This sort of exercise doesn't lend itself to outsourcing as it needs to be done in a consistent and tightly managed manner. You could issue instructions but you would be amazed at the way in which people would contrive to do something entirely different. This would particularly apply to the indexing process. And how would you get the raw material to the people doing the scanning? Few of us have collections of Model Boats going back 50+ years and the 'official' copies at MHS are in bound volumes, in a rather fragile condition in the case of the older ones. They would have to be unbound for effective copying which would probably result in them falling to pieces.

Scanner settings vary too, I found that only one setting on mine would give reasonable results. Most material is OK on 300dpi but drawings are better at 600dpi to capture the smaller text.

If you did call for volunteers I doubt if you would get more than a handful anyway.

The exercise is certainly possible but cost wise it is unlikely to make much sense, regrettably.

Incidentally, according to Paul Freshney, on average,  MHS have to sell between 70-80 copies of a plan to cover their costs in commissioning and production.

Colin

[RaaArtyGunner]

I found this interpretation of the law in the UK with regard to "fair use" and thought it might be of interest.



FAIR USE - Fair use is a limitation on the exclusive rights of the copyright owner; in other words, it allows reasonable public access to copyrighted works.
The idea is an important part of the English common-law tradition.
Why does FAIR USE exist?
FAIR USE allows people to use images and written works without compensating the original writer/creator, as long as they act in good faith and do not profit from reproducing the work.  Education, parody, criticism, news reporting, etc are all examples of fair use.
The idea of FAIR USE has guided the use of reproductions of works for years.  In most cases, the lack of commercial gain is necessary for a claim of fair use.  If you are a non-profit website designed for educational purposes, you are in the perfect position to claim FAIR USE of images which are already in the PUBLIC DOMAIN.
________________________________________
For a long time, the FAIR USE doctrine occupied a grey area of law, usually decided on a case-by-case basis.  Typically, if someone were profiting from another person's work which was not in the PUBLIC DOMAIN, it was not considered fair use.  Museums typically did not sue non-profit websites which reproduced images for educational purposes.  If they had, the court would have forced them to prove a substantial loss of profit from the use.  Understandably, such proof would not exist and the court would not look favorably upon such a vindictive case, particularly since the images were already in the public domain.


Regards Allan.

Well found  the definative answer 

[dodgy geezer]

As long as the contributor has full claim to the drawings, and no intention of claiming any future benefit from them. The only problem down the line is a future entrepreneur selling them on for his own profit.  Any actions arising would leave mayhem as the piggy in the middle.  There are plenty of sites with plans that are legally and legitimately freely available for personal use.  All of the drawings carry their authors mark, and any commercial use without appropriate permission (usually by crossing of palms with sufficient silver) would be actionable....

May I introduce those Mayhem readers who haven't heard of it to the concept of 'copyleft'? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyleft refers...

Many people (myself included) think that the whole principle of copyright is fundamentally flawed, and that it is incompatible with modern technology. Business models that depend on restricting or charging for information are becoming impossible to maintain in a world where information flows freely, even when draconian legislation is enacted to try to maintain supplier monopolies. As I recall a contributor to another thread saying - "... if you think music piracy is 'bad', just wait until 3D printer prices drop below $5000 ..."

You are probably aware of the development of free or 'open source' software, such as the Linux operating system, Open Office and the rest. All of these programs are distributed for free under an odd kind of copyright, developed by Richard Stallman (amongst others). This is usually referred to as the GNU General Public License, and is used for all Open Source code.

This is a valid copyright license, but it has some odd requirements. Very briefly, instead of restricting the right to copy an item to the 'owner' or their appointed agents on payment of a license fee, it requires anyone who copies the work, for personal or commercial use, to make it available to anyone who asks for it for free. An item of information can then be made freely available, but it is not in the public domain, and if anyone is then found selling it to people rather than giving it away they are in breach of the copyright conditions, and can be sued. Effectively, like judo, it uses the force of the copyright legislation against big business - as they extend and strengthen copyright this makes the free software movement stronger under law. Hence the term 'copyleft' (all wrongs reversed)

All the plans that I have drawn up on my site are issued under this license. I would commend it to FLJ should he wish to have watertight legal enforcement against anyone demanding money for his plans, rather than a fee for copying and posting (which is allowed).




 

[ironman]

Question for Colin.   I use 2 online photos of a tugboat, read info about this boat on 3 or 4 other websites.  I then trace the side view of the boat, scan the tracing into CAD program where I then change some of the hull shapes and upper structures to what looks good to me.  Use the articles to get actual size (length, beam, waterline).  Even change these to my liking.  Use all these modifications and scale my CAD generated drawing to what I want to build, say 1:24 scale, print them out then build from that.  Have I broken any laws?  Hope not.   Would that be scratch building?  Thanks for your input.  Ray  (ironman)

[Colin Bishop]

Ray,

Any views I have are just opinions like everyone else on this thread. However, I think what has become clear is that in practical terms you should not copy (by whatever method) somebody elses's plans and sell copies for profit.

I certainly wouldn't have any hesitation in doing what you have suggested and nor I think would anyone else who has contributed to this topic. Seems to me you are just applying research and development to meet your personal requirements.

Colin

[steamboatmodel]

Not economically viable I'm afraid. Just for Model Boats alone there would be over 700 issues with around 50,000 pages. That's maybe 12,000 articles, many of which, such as old regatta reports, would be of no interest today. Of the balance how many would you sell? If you are just taking photocopies you would need to index them, a huge job in itself. If you OCR the articles the workload would be even greater. How do I know this? Well, I did go through all 700 issues when compiling a tiny fraction for inclusion in the recent Model Boats Commemorative Special.

Yup, there is indeed gold in them thar hills but it needs a hell of a lot of mining. There may be another Special next year with a further selection of 'oldies' but it will involve a lot of work and still only scratch the surface of what is available. And that will be my interpretaion of what is of interest to modellers, everyone will have their own take on it.

Colin

Any chance of a Steam Special?
Regards,
Gerald.

[Colin Bishop]

No, afraid not, too much of a minority interest commercial wise.

Colin