Who Owns The Copyright To Public Laws?

14 May 2001 - 5:00am

The state of California does not own the copyright to its own building codes. Can public laws be copyrighted?

Peter Veeck thought he was doing everyone a favor when he posted his region's building code on the Web. "No sooner did he get the code up on the Net than he received a threatening e-mail from a lawyer.The lawyer claimed a nonprofit group...owned the copyright to that set of laws."

Source: The San Diego Union-Tribune, May 13, 2001
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