Regional Information Sharing Principles
Draft for review by the Northbay Initiative, Dec 2005
The Northbay Initiative promotes the philosophy that environmental information important for community use should be created and managed as part of a larger community resource, an Environmental Information Commons. Information owners participating in the Northbay Initiative shall use the following principles to guide their information management efforts.These principles are based on those promoted by the Information Commons (http://info-commons.org) and Creative Commons (http://creativecommons.org) projects and the Open Source Initiative.
I. Accessibility
- the information shall be made freely available. "Freely" is defined as unrestricted in its distribution in any way, such as by fees, request protocols, or conditions.
- the method of providing access is automated to the extent possible
II. Usability and interoperability
- the information resource is accessible in its most complete form, i.e., all structure as well as content is included in the distribution
- the information resource is sufficiently documented for use by others. Documentation will vary by information type, and it is recommended that information owners refer to current metadata standards and guidelines
- the information resource is developed using current applicable standards for content and structure
- the information manager shall coordinate with others managing similar information
- the resource is appropriately licensed to enable redistribution and the creation of derivitive works. It is strongly encouraged that public information* be placed in the public domain, and copyrighted information be made available under a Creative Commons or the GNU General Public license, which preserves credit while allowing free, unrestricted, non-commercial use.
III. Use practices
The Northbay Initiative encourages its members to subscribe to the intent of the Open Source Initative through the use of free-use licensed materials and to honor the obligations of licenses associated with original materials when reproducing or creating dirivitive works.
* Public information includes most information created by government organizations with public funding and not restricted in its distribution for valid reasons, such as the protection of an endangered resource, public safety, or the privacy of individuals.
Last modified by: D. DiPietro, Dec 7, 2005