“Transit Map for iPod” Site Illustrates Legal Issues In Borrowing Map Content

Free publications are not necessarily in the public domain.

New Yorker William Bright found out the hard way that free publications are not necessarily free of copyright.

The iPod, as many are aware, can be much more than an MP3 player. With custom applications being introduced and discussed nearly constantly, it can become the next best thing to a PDA: it can organize your contacts, keep your schedule, and the most recent versions can display pictures.

It must have seemed natural extension of iPod functionality for Bright to download publicly-available maps of major transit systems, adapt them in Adobe Photoshop, and size and format them for display on the iPod’s screen–not to mention a public service to the hip, urban crowd most likely to carry the popular device.

New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) and the San Francisco Bay Area’s BART see it differently, however. The maps are under copyright, and, according to this article in Wired, the New York MTA is very keen to the marketing and licensing possiblilties that subway-themed products can have. Another specific objection is that the names-and-colors combination of the lines were not changed on Bright’s versions, raising the question of derivative works and just how far a work has to be from another to be considered infringing.

According to Wired’s reporting, Bright has removed the maps from his site and is working on his own creations, and investigating licensing options.

Read the Fine Print

Perhaps because of the subject matter, it is easy to forget that the content of every map, unless expressly cited otherwise, is copyrighted. Just as it would be actionable to print someone else’s literary output as one’s own, it is similarly so for maps. A recently purchased street map of Des Moines, Iowa published by Universal Map Enterprises carries such a warning in a small white box on the bottom margin. It reads, in part:

Transport for London, the publisher of the world-famous London Underground Tube map, is similarly serious:

And earnest enough is thier concern that there is a reminder in the text near the top to proceed to the copyright text to read it.

Most maps carry such warnings, similarly worded (or hamhandedly and comically worded; a map of Port Angeles Washington I own sternly directs that “no part of this map may be used.” Period). Given that the U.S.A. is a signatory to the Berne Convention, the warning is indeed a legal courtesy to the user.

The safe assumption to make is that all cartographic content is copyrighted unless expressly said otherwise, and that any unauthorized use beyond fair-use commentary is inviting legal action. Many publishers, and certainly those that are web-based, provide avenues of inquiry for policies on use of thier material.

Don’t take chances. Read the fine print.