[reginaldjcooper]

Starting halfway through the article:

"To the SDOs [standards development organizations], the system works rather well. They take on the burden of developing standards, an obligation that in many other countries falls on government. They convene experts and build systems for collating and distributing these standards. They even offer limited free access... [Malamud] argues, the effect of these standards is felt on the ground each and every day, as well as in the pocketbooks of local governments. In a video posted by Malamud, the head building inspector for Sonoma County, Calif. testifies that the country spends about $30,000 during a code cycle buying copies of building code for staff."

Everything the government uses as a standard should be freely available to the public in a machine readable format. By selling standards to the government I assert the SDO's should be required to forfeit their copyright. But that will never happen; it's the same bullshit as with PACER and court documents, some asshole has found a way to rent-seek on publicly owned IP and the system allows it because few people care out loud.

[briancpotter]

In fact, court rulings have upheld that once a standard becomes a law, the SDOs DO forfeit their copyright. "The law can't be copyrighted" has legal precedent dating back to the 1800's, and was most recently upheld (specifically with respect to building codes) in the vase of Veeck vs. SBCCI:

http://www.studentweb.law.ttu.edu/cochran/Cases%20&%20Readin...

That's why Malamud hasn't been sued by the ICC, even though he makes their primary publications (The International Building Code, which every state uses some flavor of) freely available.