Charles Roper - Sussex Biodiversity Record Centre - 2014-06-11
There is some debate within the biodiversity informatics community as to whether species observation data is subject to copyright. It is true, data representing facts is not subject to copyright. Exceptions would be images, video and original text, such as commentary. Also, a sufficiently original selection and arrangement of data would be subject to copyright, such as an atlas or flora, but the copyright would exist in that arrangement rather than the data itself (think notes in a composition, or words in a book - the component parts are not subject to copyright, but the selection and arrangement is). Data that has involved skill and knowledge in the creation and/or verification would be subject to copyright. In short, it's a grey area. I've been doing some research on the matter and have dug up some useful reading. I'd recommend anyone involved in managing biodiversity data to get acquainted