[tz] leap_second.list not updated after latest IERS Bulletin C

[Brooks Harris]

On 12/8/2023 3:58 PM, Paul Eggert wrote:
> On 2023-12-08 11:58, Brooks Harris via tz wrote:
>> anything from IERS must be public domain, isn't it? How is it not?
>
> It’s published in France and French law does not recognize the US 
> notion of public domain. The French “domaine public” is more 
> restrictive than the US notion, and as I understand things if 
> published in France the file cannot be domaine public anyway; that can 
> happen only 70 years after publication.
>
> The IERS version lacks a copyright notice, and it’s not clear who 
> holds the copyright or under what terms TZDB could legally reproduce 
> the file. The copyright holder might be the IERS, the Paris 
> Observatory, Paris Sciences et Lettres University, the Ministry of 
> National Education, or some other body. A while ago I asked for a 
> proper copyright notice to be added, to clarify rights and establish 
> permissions, but this has not gotten anywhere presumably because the 
> people in charge of the IERS version are busy and don’t think this is 
> important.
>
> Given the legal uncertainty it’s safer for TZDB to not copy the IERS 
> version.
Thanks.

As far as I can tell there is no "leap-seconds.list" file at IERS. This 
NIST file appears to be a reconstruction of the IERS leap-second data, 
either assembled from Bulletin C, or transposed from the 
"Leap_Second_History.dat" file at 
https://hpiers.obspm.fr/eoppc/bul/bulc/Leap_Second_History.dat.

The NIST file does not appear to explicitly say its in the "public 
domain". But, as I understand it, anything NIST says, does, or publishes 
is in "public domain" as far as USA law goes. Hopefully this just 
remains a matter of my inexpert curiosity.