User talk:Wright1619

Hey can you make some more pages for civil war soldiers who received the Medal of Honor?

List of Highway Historical Markers in Bertie County, North Carolina and similar articles

Hello Wright1619. For copyright reasons, I think you had better include quotation marks when adding the text of the markers on the above and similar articles you may create in the future. This will make it clearer that you are quoting the text and that you did not write it yourself. I have done the five articles you have created so far. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!— Diannaa (talk) 17:47, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Hi, Diannaa. Copyright of works by a government agency is an interesting topic. In the case of North Carolina, state law says that "...public information compiled by the agencies of North Carolina government or its subdivisions are the property of the people." The text on the historical highway markers was compiled by a committee of the Departments of Cultural Resources and Transportation -- agencies of NC government -- so it's pretty likely public domain. However, I'm going to contact the NC Highway Historical Marker Program to get their input on this issue. Thanks for the comment!

"Property of the people" is not necessarily public domain, especially since the statute goes on to say "Therefore, it is the policy of this State that the people may obtain copies of their public records and public information free or at minimal cost unless otherwise specifically provided by law". The statute therefore seems to apply more to being free in the financial sense rather than the copyright sense. Since legislation is drafted by lawyers one would think if it was their intention to release works into the public domain they would simply say so. "Pretty likely public domain" is insufficient for our purposes. — Diannaa (talk) 13:05, 28 November 2021 (UTC)

Email has been sent to the NC agency. They're understaffed, but may find it to be an interesting question!