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Public.Resource.Org (PRO) is a
501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of ...
non-profit corporation dedicated to publishing and sharing
public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. Because those rights have expired ...
materials in the
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
and internationally. It was founded by
Carl Malamud Carl Malamud (born July 2, 1959) is an American technologist, author, and public domain advocate, known for his foundation Public.Resource.Org. He founded the Internet Multicasting Service. During his time with this group, he was responsible fo ...
and is based in
Sebastopol, California Sebastopol ( ) is a city in Sonoma County, in California with a recorded population of 7,521, per the 2020 U.S. Census. Sebastopol was once primarily a plum and apple-growing region. Today, wine grapes are the predominant agriculture crop, ...
. Public.Resource.Org takes particular interest in digitizing and making accessible the works of the United States Federal Government, which because of US government licensing rules for its own work are almost always in the public domain. Major projects conducted by the organization include the digitizing and sharing of large numbers of court records, US government-produced video, and laws of various places.


Operation strategy

Malamud works on the premise that information in the
public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. Because those rights have expired ...
, and particularly government-generated information of this sort, ought to be as easy as possible for the public to access. In doing this, he identifies interesting collections of information held by organizations which have failed to grant free public access to it. Two typical circumstances are that the creator of the information has failed to make it available online in any form, or that the creator has provided the information to a private company which itself charges fees for access to the information. At this point, Malamud acquires the free information himself, publishes it in public.resource.org as a free communication channel, and then demonstrates publicly that he has made information free when otherwise it would not be and calls for pressure on the holder of the information to collaborate in developing the information release.


Projects


Access to IRS Form 990 in digital format

In 2013, Public.Resource.Org filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requesting copies of nine annual information reports (
Form 990 Form 990 (officially, the "Return of Organization Exempt From Income Tax") is a United States Internal Revenue Service form that provides the public with financial information about a nonprofit organization. It is often the only source of such i ...
, ''Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax'') in digital format for tax-exempt entities in MeF (modernized e-file) format. The IRS refused to provide the MeF files, claiming that the effort to edit them to conform to required privacy standards for the filers represented an unreasonable burden. On January 29, 2015, a U.S. District Court ruled against the IRS, requiring that the IRS provide the requested files within 60 days. Observers believe that this decision will result in the IRS moving more rapidly toward providing electronic versions of Form 990 to the public.


Access to United States legal resources

In 2007 Malamud began publishing the full text of United States legal opinions dating from 1880 in an effort to begin a process intended to create a free publicly accessible database intended to hold the entirety of US Case law. Goals of the project included the creation of "an unencumbered full-text repository of the Federal Reporter, the Federal Supplement, and the Federal Appendix" and "an unencumbered full-text repository of all state and federal cases and codes." In describing this project, journalist
Tim O'Reilly Tim O'Reilly (born 6 June 1954) is the founder of O'Reilly Media (formerly O'Reilly & Associates). He popularised the terms open source and Web 2.0. Education and early life Born in County Cork, Ireland, Tim O'Reilly moved to San Francisco, C ...
described this information to be "clearly public data" yet also "the crown jewels of public data available for profit", as companies including
West West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...
had collected billions of dollars in fees for granting access to this data. Malamud called for increased awareness that Westlaw was a commercial broker of the United States Federal Reporter, Federal Supplement, and Federal Appendix. While Westlaw had been adding value to the content by indexing it with their proprietary
West American Digest System The West American Digest System is a system of identifying points of law from reported cases and organizing them by topic and key number. The system was developed by West Publishing to organize the entire body of American law. This extensive taxon ...
and accompanying summaries, the purchase of their products was the only way to access much of the public domain material they hosted. Malamud began to distribute these materials for free while saying in an open letter to the company In 2010 Google awarded the project 2 million USD in funding through their Project 10^100 challenge to submit ideas for changing the world.


FedFlix

Public.Resource.Org collects old and forgotten United States government video, digitizes it, and distributes it for free online in a project called FedFlix. Video is purchased or requested from government agencies such as the
National Technical Information Service The National Technical Information Service (NTIS) is an agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce. The primary mission of NTIS is to collect and organize scientific, technical, engineering, and business information generated by U.S. Gove ...
. These videos are digitized and uploaded with
metadata Metadata is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive metadata – the descriptive ...
to
YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
and Public.Resource.Org's servers. Most of these videos were produced with federal government funding and intended for educational purposes. There is also a collection of videos from FedFlix at the
Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
which contains over 8,700 items. YouTube's Content ID tool helps copyright holders make requests to remove their copyrighted videos from YouTube. Malamud has complained that large media organizations are using this tool to unfairly attack and call for the removal of Public.Resource.Org's upload of US federal government videos on the improper claim of their copyright over them, when in fact these works are purported by the US government to be public domain works.


Yes We Scan

"Yes We Scan" is a phrase used as a name for various Public.Resource.Org projects which have the goal of digitizing and making available large collections of documents. In 2009 when
Carl Malamud Carl Malamud (born July 2, 1959) is an American technologist, author, and public domain advocate, known for his foundation Public.Resource.Org. He founded the Internet Multicasting Service. During his time with this group, he was responsible fo ...
petitioned to become the
Public Printer of the United States The Public Printer of the United States was the head of the United States Government Publishing Office (GPO). Pursuant to , this officer was nominated by the President of the United States and approved by the United States Senate. In December 20 ...
the campaign slogan was "Yes we scan!" In 2011 Public.Resource.org submitted a "YesWeScan.org" proposal to the United States federal government petitioning system
We the People The Preamble to the United States Constitution, beginning with the words We the People, is a brief introductory statement of the Constitution's fundamental purposes and guiding principles. Courts have referred to it as reliable evidence o ...
asking for the creation of a plan to scan all public federal government holdings.
David Ferriero David Sean Ferriero (; born December 31, 1945) is an American librarian and library administrator, who served as the 10th Archivist of the United States. He previously served as the Director of the New York Public Library,Oder, Norman. "NYPL Reor ...
responded to the petition describing efforts to increase availability of government archives. In 2013 Public.Resource.Org organized a fundraiser for a Yes We Scan project to collect, digitize, and make available all government
safety standards Safety standards are standards designed to ensure the safety of products, activities and processes, etc. They may be advisory or compulsory and are normally laid down by an advisory or regulatory body that may be either voluntary or statutory. In ...
in every country. In 2010 Public.Resource.Org managed a smaller project to free the public safety codes in
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
in the United States.


C-SPAN video licensing

In 2007 Malamud petitioned for more open access to some C-SPAN recordings.
C-SPAN Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN ) is an American cable and satellite television network that was created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a nonprofit public service. It televises many proceedings of the United States ...
is a private media company which records and broadcasts the discussions of the United States Congress. The company's business model is to provide its recordings for fees to cable and satellite television broadcasters. In February 2007,
Nancy Pelosi Nancy Patricia Pelosi (; ; born March 26, 1940) is an American politician who has served as Speaker of the United States House of Representatives since 2019 and previously from 2007 to 2011. She has represented in the United States House of ...
was publishing on her blog as
Speaker of the United States House of Representatives The speaker of the United States House of Representatives, commonly known as the speaker of the House, is the presiding officer of the United States House of Representatives. The office was established in 1789 by Article I, Section 2 of the ...
and inserted video clips from C-SPAN into her messages. Persons representing her opposing political party claimed that she was violating copyright in using the videos. C-SPAN investigated the situation and found that in some cases she was and in other cases she was not, and they clarified their position in the media. C-SPAN confirmed that through more than 25 years of operating it had consistently asserted its copyright over all of the material which it created with its own cameras, which was 85-95% of its content. The rest of its content was produced on the House and Senate floors with government cameras, and this material was in fact public domain content as a work of the US federal government. A representative of C-SPAN said that "It is perfectly understandable to me that people would be confused ... (because the situation is that) when a congressman says something on the floor it is public domain, but (when) he walks down the street to a committee hearing or give a speech and (then) it is not public domain. The representative went on to say that "I think a lot of people don't understand (that) C-SPAN is a business, just like CNN is, ... (and) If we don't have a revenue stream, we wouldn't have six crews ready to cover Congressional hearings." In 2007 Malamud petitioned for more open access to some C-SPAN recordings.
Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. The foundation was formed on 10 July 1990 by John Gilmore, John Perry Barlow and Mitch Kapor to promote Internet ...
credited Malamud's efforts and a letter to
Brian Lamb Brian Patrick Lamb (; born October 9, 1941) is an American journalist. He is the founder, executive chairman, and the now-retired CEO of C-SPAN, an American cable network that provides coverage of the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Sen ...
of C-SPAN to their agreement in 2007 to make congressional recordings much more accessible.


Smithsonian Institution protest

In 2006 Malamud complained that private company
Showtime Networks Showtime Networks Inc. is an American entertainment company that oversees the company's premium cable television channels, including its flagship service Showtime. It is a subsidiary of media conglomerate Paramount Global under its networks uni ...
and the publicly owned
Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Found ...
were entering a contract to establish
Smithsonian Networks The Smithsonian Channel is an American pay television channel owned by Paramount Global through its media networks division under MTV Entertainment Group. It offers video content inspired by the Smithsonian Institution's museums, research facilit ...
without sufficient public disclosure. Under the contract Showtime would be able to deny permission to other media producers wishing access to Smithsonian collections. Documentarian
Ken Burns Kenneth Lauren Burns (born July 29, 1953) is an American filmmaker known for his documentary films and television series, many of which chronicle American history and culture. His work is often produced in association with WETA-TV and/or th ...
said of this deal "I find this deal terrifying ... It feels like the Smithsonian has essentially optioned America's attic to one company".


Academic publishing

Public.Resource.org supports research to identify knowledge within the body of academic publications. A profile in 2019 reported that the organization had collaborated with
Jawaharlal Nehru University Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) is a public major research university located in New Delhi, India. It was established in 1969 and named after Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first Prime Minister. The university is known for leading faculties an ...
and Sci-Hub to gather a collection of research literature for use in data mining. The project raised various ethical issues including the right to the public to share in knowledge versus the right of publishers to restrict access to their copyrighted works.


Legal cases


''American Society for Testing and Materials et al. v. Public.Resource.Org''

In 2013, Public.Resource.Org was sued by the
American Society for Testing and Materials ASTM International, formerly known as American Society for Testing and Materials, is an international standards organization that develops and publishes voluntary consensus technical standards for a wide range of materials, products, systems, an ...
, the
National Fire Protection Association The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) is an international nonprofit organization devoted to eliminating death, injury, property and economic loss due to fire, electrical and related hazards. As of 2018, the NFPA claims to have 50,000 mem ...
, and the
American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE ) is an American professional association seeking to advance heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration (HVAC&R) systems design and constructio ...
for scanning and making available
building code A building code (also building control or building regulations) is a set of rules that specify the standards for constructed objects such as buildings and non-building structures. Buildings must conform to the code to obtain planning permissi ...
s and fire codes which these organizations consider their copyrighted property. The case was heard in the District Court of the District of Columbia, with Judge
Tanya S. Chutkan Tanya Sue Chutkan (born July 5, 1962) is a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Biography Chutkan was born on July 5, 1962, in Kingston, Jamaica. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree ...
presiding. Chutkan ruled against Public.Resource.Org and ordered Malamud to delete all the standards from the Internet. Public.Resource.Org appealed the case to the D.C. Circuit. A number of library and public interest associations weighed in supporting the position of Public.Resource.Org. In 2018, the D.C. Circuit reversed and remanded the decision, holding that the fair use doctrines had been improperly applied. In March 2022 Chutkan issued an opinion that would allow Public.Resource.Org to reproduce 184 standards under fair use, partially reproduce 1 standard, and deny reproduction of 32 standards that were found to differ in substantive ways from those incorporated by law. ASTM et al. appealed the case to the D.C. Circuit. Final briefs are due February 2023.


''Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org''

The
Official Code of Georgia Annotated The Official Code of Georgia Annotated or OCGA is the compendium of all laws in the U.S. state of Georgia. Like other U.S. state codes, its legal interpretation is subject to the United States Constitution, the United States Code, the Code of ...
(OCGA) is the official law of
Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...
. The Georgia government asserts that it holds the copyright to the OCGA; further, Georgia's legislature has exempted itself from the state's open records law. While the state claims that the OCGA is easily accessible,
journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalis ...
s for Atlanta news channel 11Alive were "unable to find a complete set of current law books at three branches of the Fulton County Public Library". Malamud purchased a 186-volume hard copy of the OCGA and published the contents on Public.Resource.Org. The
Code Revision Commission In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communication ...
of the
Georgia General Assembly The Georgia General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is bicameral, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. Each of the General Assembly's 236 members serve two-year terms and are direct ...
sued PRO for copyright infringement, demanding that the OCGA be taken offline. A federal court in the
United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia The United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia (in case citations, N.D. Ga.) is a United States district court which serves the residents of forty-six counties. These are divided up into four divisions. Appeals from cases ...
ruled in favor of the state, writing that PRO did not "
eet "Eet" is a song from Regina Spektor's fifth studio album, ''Far (album), Far''. It was released as the album's second official single in October 2009. In Europe it was released as a digital download on November 27, 2009. Music video A Viral vide ...
its burden of proving fair use". PRO immediately appealed. The
United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit (in case citations, 11th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the following U.S. district courts: * Middle District of Alabama * Northern District of Alabama * ...
unanimously struck down the previous ruling, finding that the OCGA is "intrinsically public domain material". The government of Georgia appealed to the Supreme Court. Both PRO and the state of Georgia urged the
Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...
to grant
certiorari In law, ''certiorari'' is a court process to seek judicial review of a decision of a lower court or government agency. ''Certiorari'' comes from the name of an English prerogative writ, issued by a superior court to direct that the record of ...
to the government's appeal. The Supreme Court agreed to review the case (No. 18-1150). In 2020, the Court ruled 5–4 that the OCGA cannot be copyrighted..


Responses

Ralph Nader Ralph Nader (; born February 27, 1934) is an American political activist, author, lecturer, and attorney noted for his involvement in consumer protection, environmentalism, and government reform causes. The son of Lebanese immigrants to the Un ...
endorses the work of the organization.


References


External links

*
Yes We Scan
* {{Authority control category:501(c)(3) organizations category:public domain category:open data