[lightbyte]

>“But given your access to the MTA map on the MTA website, and the substantial similarities of your map to the MTA map, the only rational conclusion is that your map is based on the MTA Vignelli map.”

>But there is a potentially critical flaw in that logic. The MTA created The Weekender in 2011, two years after Berman created his map, which he uploaded to Wikipedia in 2009.

There needs to be consequences for such blatant fraud and abuse of the DMCA, ridiculous claims like this have gotten so common.

[sitkack]

The MTA is a government org, how can it even own the copy right to ‘its’ map?

[SamBam]

You'd be surprised. Some cities even claim copyright over their own laws.

https://abovethelaw.com/2017/10/can-you-copyright-the-law/

[EvanAnderson]

The federal government's works are public domain, however state and local government may claim copyright.

[trickstra]

The privatization of profits and the socialization of losses are the signs of a corrupt system.

"Let's make money on something that was created with public money"

"Let's rescue this private business with the public money"

[chimeracoder]

> The MTA is a government org

Surprised none of the other comments have pointed out that this is not true. The MTA is a public benefit corporation, which is a concept particular to New York State.

The simplest way to describe a NY public benefit corporation is that it's a private corporation, but the board of directors for the corporation is appointed by the governor.

Court rulings have confirmed that employees of PBCs in NY are not state employees; they are employees of the corporation.

[fortran77]

In the United States, only the Federal Government's works can't be copyrighted. But it's complicated. See https://www.copyrightlaws.com/copyright-laws-in-u-s-governme...

[scarejunba]

They can. California cannot copyright its products by California law, a law that would be unnecessary if California could not copyright its work.

[JackFr]

Why would they own intellectual property they created any less than they own the trains and the land?

[vonmoltke]

State and local governments oven plenty of copyrights and trademarks.

[lotsofpulp]

At the root of it is corruption. Someone is collecting benefits privately from taxpayer funded organizations.

[ummonk]

In fairness, I think the claim (still meritless) would be that he adapted the original Vignelli map, not the version of it that the MTA started using in 2011.

[blackearl]

Doing a search of "transit maps" yields lots of similar looking maps. Maybe there was an originator of the style, but it certainly wasn't the MTA

[blackearl]

It would be great if he could flip this on the MTA

[ikeboy]

There would be consequences if he sued, but most likely the complaint will just be reversed and everybody moves on.

Based on the article, though, the MTA might have a good faith defense. If they believed it was based on their map, and retract it after being made aware that it was not, they could win on a good faith defense.

[ChikkaChiChi]

>There needs to be consequences for such blatant fraud and abuse of the DMCA, ridiculous claims like this have gotten so common.

Absolutely. Unfortunately, common sense does not appear to be a powerful lobby in any country.

People in power are never going to prescribe consequences for their own behavior.