www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,68967,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_2
The site is run by New Yorker William Bright, who said he fell into trans it bureaucracy crosshairs after posting a digitized copy of the New York City subway system map on Aug.
Gawker the day after it started, and the site exploded," he said. More than 9,000 people downloaded the map, which was viewable on either a n iPod or an iPod nano, before Bright received a Sept.
letter fro m Lester Freundlich, a senior associate counsel at New York's Metropolit an Transit Authority, saying that Bright had infringed the MTA's copyrig ht and that he needed a license to post the map and to authorize others to download it. "I' m very aware that they are copyright violations, but I'm not trying to m ake money or do anything malicious. Last week Bright received a similar cease-and-desist letter from official s with Bay Area Rapid Transit, or BART, demanding that Bright remove a m ap of the San Francisco rail system.
San Francisco BART maps from the official websites, cut them into smaller sections in Adobe Pho toshop, and then put them back together at resolutions that are readable on iPods. The iPod photo resolution, for example, is 220 by 176 pixels, while the n ano is at 176 by 136, he said. Straphangers can scroll through the maps using the iPod's click wheel. Bright took down the BART map last week, but the relative simplicity of t he system allowed him to create a map of his own that he believes avoids copyright restrictions. He released it under a Creative Commons license on Thursday. He also spent about 20 hours in the past week making his own map of the n umerous, tentacled subway lines that run through Manhattan, Queens, Broo klyn and the Bronx. The layout and fonts are different than the MTA's ma p, but the subway line colors are the same, which is why Bright wants to talk to a copyright lawyer before posting it, he said.
The New York Times reported in June that the MTA has begun registering it s colorful route symbols as trademarks and has sent more than 30 cease-a nd-desist letters to businesses that had been using the route symbols to sell such items as bagels, perfume, T-shirts and tote bags. The financially strapped MTA has a licensing department that has approved about 25 product lines, including neckties and coffee mugs, the Times r eported. Bright said he plans to contact the licensing department. "My guess is that it comes into a gray area when I start distributing the map and maybe when I put up ads, even though I make just about a buck a day with Google ads," he said. BART's letter to Bright read in part, "There is a widespread belief that materials published by public agencies such as BART are in the public do main. Bright also used a map that became outdated when the BART system extended one of its lines and shortened another, said Jim Allison, a spokesman f or BART. "We don't have a problem with people disseminating information about BART," Allison said. "We do have a problem with people pirating in formation that is incorrect," he said. The spokesman added that BART is preparing to unveil its own free, downlo adable iPod map on its website.
More stories written by Matt Reed ^1 Correction, 09/27/2005 11:39 AM: An earlier version of this story inco rrectly reported that Bright's new map uses the same fonts and colors as the MTA's map.
Cancel Note: You are reading this message either because you can not see our css files (served from Akamai for performance reasons), or because you do n ot have a standards-compliant browser.
Note: You are reading this message instead of message board comments eith er because you have javascript turned off, are running software that pre vents you from viewing 3rd party javascript files (ours are served from Akamai for performance reasons), or because you do not have a supported browser.
Terms & Conditions Note: You are reading this message either because you can not see our css files (served from Akamai for performance reasons), or because you do n ot have a standards-compliant browser.
|
http://csua.com/feed/