When did UpCodes change?

[Joe Moore]

I'm fine with that....As I cannot afford all of the referenced standards anyway (which are growing exponentially in each adoption).....When those organizations give free copies to the AHJ's I may support pro codes....

Who will fund the development of all of the referenced standards if there is no income from the process. I guess the government funds will be allocated to create these documents. That will make them "free". Pay more taxes to get free codes and standards.

If the AHJ is a member of ICC or you have an individual membership, you will receive a complimentary electronic copy of every code ICC publishes every 3 years. You will also have read privileges to an number of additional documents.

 

[steveray]

If the AHJ is a member of ICC or you have an individual membership, you will receive a complimentary electronic copy of every code ICC publishes every 3 years. You will also have read privileges to an number of additional documents.

And none of the standards.....

 

[steveray]

Who will fund the development of all of the referenced standards if there is no income from the process.

I guess the people that want the new standard for their new product....

 

[Paul Sweet]

Years decades ago trade organizations would write standards and sell them to A/Es and distributors at a nominal cost, or give them away, to encourage use of their products. Somewhere along the line somebody figured out they were missing out on big bucks and the prices started going way up.

 

[Gary2000]

If they are successful, ICC, NFPA, ASTM, et al will cease to exist.

This is what the publishers have been saying, yet it's not true. UpCodes has been giving the law away free and unfettered since February 2016, almost 10 years ago. And yet, the publishers are making more money than they have, paying their CEOs salaries upwards of $1M (10x the median non-profit salary). Just check the 990s (ICC, NFPA).

And courts have noted this too. In the SBCCI case (SBCCI going on to become ICC) and cited again in ICC v UpCodes (2020), the courts noted:

"it is difficult to imagine an area of creative endeavor in which the copyright incentive is needed less. Trade organizations have powerful reasons stemming from industry standardization, quality control, and self regulation to produce these model codes; it is unlikely that, without copyright, they will cease producing them."

In ASTM, NFPA, ASHRAE et al v Public.Resource.Org, the court noted:

"Public Resource has been posting incorporated standards for fifteen years. Yet the plaintiffs have been unable to produce any economic analysis showing that Public Resource's activity has harmed any relevant market for their standards. To the contrary, ASTM's sales have increased over that time"

We discuss that in our FAQ here.

 

[Gary2000]

Here's ICC's revenues. And their CEO made a salary $1,344,655 in that last reported year. They're doing better than ever.

 

[Yankee Chronicler]

If the AHJ is a member of ICC or you have an individual membership, you will receive a complimentary electronic copy of every code ICC publishes every 3 years. You will also have read privileges to an number of additional documents.

I have been a professional member of the ICC since it was created, and I was a professional member of BOCA and ICBO before the ICC. The ICC used to give us a copy of the codes as PDFs, but I don't think they still do. If they do, please tell me how I get my free PDFs of the 2024 I-Codes, because I can't find it.