-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Mon, Mar 07, 2016 at 04:38:55PM -0600, Don Armstrong wrote: > On Mon, 07 Mar 2016, Peter Rice wrote: > > The conclusion was that scientific data (SwissProt, PDB, etc.) are > > scientific facts and it is not reasonable to require permission to > > change them. > > This isn't true; there are loads of reasons to change sequences and > structural models of proteins. Protein sequences are just based on > references which have inaccuracies and do not represent ancestral > sequences or the true variation present in real populations; in my lab > we modify UniProt sequences and redistribute those modifications in > publications all of the time.
Note that this text only says that if you modify things, you're required to change the name. In other words, they are protecting the terminology, so when you use a certain code, everyone is always talking about the same thing. This is a very reasonable thing to require; without it, the database would be much less useful. > All of that said, because PDB and UniProt files are not works of > authorship, they likely do not qualify for copyright protection in the > US, so the licensing terms can largely be ignored. However, that may not > be true of other jurisdictions. The text that was quoted doesn't really talk about IP; it just says that it isn't about that: as a user, you must find the license and abide by it. This is annoying (because it means you must find those licenses before you know if you can use the data), but I don't blame them. On the other hand, if you are correct (I have no idea about this data) that it is not copyrightable, then you also don't need a license, so that solves that problem. The question would probably have been better asked on -legal though, so I'm sending it there. For those reading there without seeing the thread before, it starts here: https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2016/03/msg00091.html Thanks, Bas -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1 iQIcBAEBAgAGBQJW3kjSAAoJEJzRfVgHwHE6vUIP/2c9sCzBFH7L2muFotxeDFnB 9A3TRZbTfRX05Ik9FZyFSZr/zE/XEHA/aMogvEu1sB3Z1XpyEEx5Q+kvDiB4lqL7 6h5g5LTXWKIzdPDNciwCMSVqpBtPfuOJ11qEGPRZbsPVfXLjoSh+bjarSmYltun+ TlcpkOwcpSuevJI+BVxDKz5L59DcNqp/0Dh8kj2ek+dzDWmOiyJ1azqx6DptR3KB uZ0gKi7LRsOjy6f6Q/bKs5Ym0it4CoVIBYuABAxFV6YsoP7qeUQqhd9gWqw9jAuV 6JTxnyLBwEZHJ640PAvTl/Q7W7+LL3aRQvqwCUfLUKtvAVywR5mBzTn5DrY0r8SO ms0bftWq2DFezqctn8WYMvseIjkq4k2/Bt2e59dIi8d8ytj79dE5+raYl/cYYNUt 71shP7r+41zRb23ZguRVHcpOIBMu5UlhHpXR8PWhUhDF4mhnPDBXZGmvrZTTgVjy iOHC3g7EtFg5NZTdMeeKs7NyKtT9ZLLDbwqiVmKSTPgIGywSyVLpR2X+5S0pek3C ybtvSBifRQd8m/nhveQiQFAhNIpJHjFimdzTObKonKVAGAhag4TlvO9dak921CZK TWii3txJnPmTMAaR/LGY8VjlcJjwN3J1UZTvB/0HTVGnLEUjSxtN0f6BQo1KXVSV TDvMAD6wYUfdt9Ik9krj =bzir -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
