[Foundation-l] Request for approval for a wiki for standards

Sat Jan 7 18:33:23 UTC 2006

Ray Saintonge wrote:

> To what extent do these standards have the force of law, particularly 
> in the United States.  When the United States ratifies a treaty it 
> means that it has effectively made that treaty a part of the law of 
> the United States.  Since US laws are excluded from copyright we 
> should be free to include the standards that have been so adopted into 
> Wikisource.

Generally they aren't adopted verbatim into law---instead the law 
references the standards, which still remain under copyright.  For 
example, the law will include a phrase like "for devices in compliance 
with ISO standard xxxxx", but will not actually include the text of said 
standard.

-Mark