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Copyright Approval from the ICC

jar546

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I am putting together a Power Point presentation for code education on framing and the IRC. I contacted the ICC to let them know and was directed to email them a lot of detailed information so that they can grant me permission to use excerpts from the IRC, including some tables in the Power Point presentation. They promised me they would get back to me in about a week with a yes or no and a PRICE!

Yes, you have to pay to do things the right way. I can't wait to see how much this is going to cost. I am hoping it is a nominal fee and not something crazy.

Does anyone else have experience with this or have any idea how much I can expect to pay for approval to use copyrighted material so that I don't infringe?
 
The Fair Use doctrine should give you protection especially if you have no handouts. I believe that you would really have to go to extremes if the handouts were to violate the fair use doctrine. A number of things come into play but if you are not charging for the work you have more latitude.

The local structural engineers association has prepared a commentary on Chapter 17 of the building code which included a lot of code language with added commentary. The commentary was made available for free. The organization got permission from ICC and did not have to pay any fee.

In one of the federal court districts there is an appeals court ruling that the code as adopted by a jurisdiction cannot be copyrighted. Thus if you live in that district you do not need any permission. In other federal court districts this is not considered settled law but the reality is that ICC does not appear to want to litigate the issue since there is a good chance they will loose which will embold others to prepare derivative works.

When going this route it is important to differentiate between the model code and the code adopted by a local or state government. For example ICC has a copyright on the IBC as a model code but not on the very similar version adopted by your state or local jurisdiction.

Bottom line is that either you have no problem or you do not appear to have a problem unless you do something bold like copying significant portions of the building code and selling the copies.
 
I was told that all material is copyrighted. I brought up the fact that the codes are adopted all over and Florida, for example has it online. I was told that it was the ICC that puts it online for them but it is still copyrighted material.

I would love to know if the ICC has ever legally challenged someone using their material to teach their material, especially when these courses usually end up in more book sales for the ICC.
 
cda said:
There ain't no free lunch out hereYou have to put in your time.
I will be finding out just how much this lunch is going to cost me by next week. As far as the putting in your time, I don't know what you mean by that.
 
So say a city publishes the entire irc online, because they adopted it.

Isn't that open for use?? So take the info off someone's web site

I thought there were a couple of threads on here basically saying that
 
I don't know if there are other threads. There can never be enough threads here anyway. I will now research to see. In addition, I will post what happens with this.
 
Standards organizations will argue that without the copyright, they can’t fund the valuable work they do. They have a point. (And their work is valuable.) But in 2002, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decided in Veeck v. Southern Building Code Congress International, Inc. that even though SDOs hold copyright on codes that haven’t become laws, they lose that copyright when their code is adopted by a legislature.

http://www.constructionweblinks.com/resources/industry_reports__newsletters/May_17_2004/supreme.html
 
VEECK v. SOUTHERN BUILDING CODE CONGRESS INTERNATIONAL, INC., 293 F.3d 791 (5th Cir. 2002)

Before KING, Chief Judge, JOLLY, HIGGINBOTHAM, DAVIS, JONES, SMITH, WIENER, BARKSDALE, EMILIO M. GARZA, DeMOSS, BENAVIDES, STEWART, PARKER, DENNIS and CLEMENT, Circuit Judges.

EDITH H. JONES, Circuit Judge:

[1] The issue in this en banc case is the extent to which a private organization may assert copyright protection for its model codes, after the models have been adopted by a legislative body and become "the law". Specifically, may a code-writing organization prevent a website operator from posting the text of a model code where the code is identified simply as the building code of a city that enacted the model code as law? Our short answer is that as law, the model codes enter the public domain and are not subject to the copyright holder's exclusive prerogatives. As model codes, however, the organization's works retain their protected status.

full text linked here

VEECK v. SOUTHERN BUILDING CODE CONGRESS INTERNATIONAL, INC., 293 F.3d 791 (5th Cir. 2002)
 
jar546 said:
I am putting together a Power Point presentation for code education on framing and the IRC. I contacted the ICC to let them know and was directed to email them a lot of detailed information so that they can grant me permission to use excerpts from the IRC, including some tables in the Power Point presentation. They promised me they would get back to me in about a week with a yes or no and a PRICE!Yes, you have to pay to do things the right way. I can't wait to see how much this is going to cost. I am hoping it is a nominal fee and not something crazy.

Does anyone else have experience with this or have any idea how much I can expect to pay for approval to use copyrighted material so that I don't infringe?
FROM THE ICC

http://www.icc.edu/innovation/PDFS/copyright/Copyright%20FairUseICC.pdf

The Fair Use Doctrine allows for limited use of copyrighted work for educational purposes. The 4 guiding

principles of fair use are purpose, nature, amount, and effect.

1. Purpose – For what reason is the material being used? Non-profit, educational use is favored for fair use, while commercial use is disfavored.

2. Nature – What type of work is it? Fictional work is more likely to require permission than with factual work.

3. Amount – How much of the work is being used? Guidelines that have been set by various organizations are not law, but these guidelines are usually followed. A general guideline for brevity is no more than 10% of the work or 1,000 words, whichever is less – providing it is not the core of the material. With recorded works, the guideline is no more than 10% or 30 seconds of the work.

4. Effect – What is the effect on the market or potential market for a copyrighted work? Copying large portions of a work, in order for the student to not have to purchase the book, would have an effect on the market for the work. Under the fair use guidelines, workbooks (without permission from the publisher) are never allowed to be copied due to this factor.

Markie Castle is the copyright facilitator for the ICC faculty and staff. She is available to:

Provide guidance and assistance (not legal counsel) concerning copyright issues.

Research whether material needed in a classroom would be considered fair use.

Research copyright permission from appropriate party, if material does not fall under “fair use”.

Support an ongoing education program on copyright laws and fair use.

Markie is available on all campuses. Call the TLC (694-8908) for her office hours or contact her at mcastle@icc.edu to make an appointment to meet with her.

For more information concerning copyright issues, select “Copyright Services” from the menu on theInstructional Innovation webpage or go to: http://www.icc.edu/innovation/copyrightServices.asp

Questions? Contact Markie Castle – mcastle@icc.edu
 
ICC is going to argue that it has copyright especially outside of the Fifth Circuit Court District since it is in their best interest to take the position even if it is not true. If what they have put online is the IBC or the IRC it is copyrighted and they are correct but if what they have put online is the Florida Code then it is not necessarily so.

The implied threat that they will take the supposed offender to court will cause many individuals to play by their rules. What they have on their side is the fact that other federal circuit courts have not taken a position on this issue.

Since ICC does not want to litigate the issue they are inclined to be reasonable especially if you do not publicly challenge them. Also politically it would look so bad if they took a city to court on this issue given that you are not selling copies of the code. They do not want the publicity.

Bottom line is that I would be very very surprised if ICC asks you to pay anything.
 
We used the IPMC and made it our own. I had to submit it all to ICC, an Arizona office I believe. We paid around 7,000 to be able to use the amount of info.
 
The only mistake you made was asking ICC. They cannot and never could copyright adopted laws. We post I-codes here all the time. Handouts and power point presentations containing code sections are used in Texas and Oklahoma on a regular basis for CEU classes.

Uncle Bob

 
Guess the public has to buy their own copy, if you tell them to comply with blah,blah,blah section, and not give them a copy,

Or send them to whoever keeps the official copy.
 
If it is not for profit, and you print the percent identified in my previous post you will not have an issue with the ICC
 
Uncle Bob is correct. In Texas it is settled law. In Oklahoma like most of the rest of the country there is legal precedence to support his position. I would expect that if it was litigated you would win.

Has anybody looked at the cost that ICC charges for state codes, such as California where they publish the California Building Code. In Calif ICC doubles the cost, compared to the IBC, when the added content is provided to them by the state. There costs cannot be that much higher thus the only conclusion is that they are making much higher profits.
 
Update:

the update is that there is no update. Almost 2 weeks later and no response from the 2 emails sent, even though on the phone I was told they would get back to me within a week. Not even acknowledgement of receiving the emails. Thank you ICC for making this smooth.

on another front, I submitted for ICC ceu approval and sent an email asking a question about the process for additional information that I need to submit and, of course, no response.

Glad to see they make the educational requirements so easy to develop.
 
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