British Archaeology and Duodecahedral Mystery Fever (III): This is Mine!

 

Bonkers does not even begin to describe the situation over the Norton Disney dodecahedron - part (as we say) of the common archaeological heritage of us all. Except it is not... says the "Responsible Finder" who reported it to the PAS so it could be recorded for public benefit. Look at this public record funded by public money to record for public benefit items ripped out of a common resource .

DODECAHEDRON
Unique ID: LIN-BC9890
Object type certainty: Certain
Workflow status: Published Find published
A complete cast copper-alloy dodecahedron [...]

Notes: Enquiries relating to the creation of 3D Models.

Please note that a license from the private owner of that object is required before creating and distributing a 3D model of the dodecahedron. However, the owner is choosing to remain anonymous. There will be a published report that will be submitted to the Lincolnshire Historic Environment Record (HER) although again the report will still be copyrighted by its author(s), so again, permission is required to use that [sic PMB] data for any models.   [...]  

This raises so many questions. 

The Note does not cite the legal basis for that, nor the precise circumstances referred to. It is very questionable whether there is such a basis. The intellectual property rights and copyright of the creator of the object itself have expired. The guy died a millennium and a half or more ago, as have any folk he could have transferred those rights to. 

But at any rate, if this object came from an archaeological excavation, who here is claiming those rights? The dig director, the volunteer who mattocked it out of the ground, the lady who made the teas in the tent, or the landowner? (The latter can hardly be anonymous, we know who they are.) 

The mention of a "published report copyrighted by its author [...] permission is required to use [those] data for any models". What kind of 3-d model data of the excavated finds are going to be in that report? Usually though, when you submit a text to somebody who will use it, you also sign a form assigning to them the rights. So not the "authors" but administrators of the LHER.  What the PAS have published is nonsense. 

Why are 3-d printouts of artefacts a problem to the PAS? I think it is a really good idea, everyone can have a printout of the Venus of Willendorf, a Clovis point, or some Mesopotamian cunies with the Flood story, or a cylinder seal ("showing the Aneki and Nibiru" - or whatever). There are quite a lot of them on eBay and Etsy, a lot of them with "Biblical" associations.  I see nothing wrong (if they are good quality and accurate) with people collecting them instead of collecting real dugup ones, indeed I would even commend it, and encourage their production.   Museums all over the world sell casts, electrotypes or impressions of objects in their collections so people can enjoy them at home (The BM where the PAS is, does a nice line). We remember also the case of a purported scan of the Nefertiti bust in the German museum (that Egypt alleges was removed from the country dishonestly) that you can now buy to print out to have one yourself. Now an official version is also available (nota bene through a 2019 challenge to precisely the same kind of restrictions that the BM's PAS is trying here to enforce).  

I am not clear what "data" the PAS are referriung to. Has somebody 3d-scanned the Norton Disney dodecahedron and then somebody stole the files? Is that what this is about? Or are they talking about somebody taking flat 2-d photos from the public domain and through creative jiggery-pokery turning the shades and highlights into contours that are then used with a bit of geometry to assemble a 3-d model? I would argue that, if the latter, the resultant model is the creation of its creator (duh) rather than infringing on the rights of any anonymous finder or the creators old geometry teacher. 

It so happens that there was what purported to be a scan of the Norton Disney dodecahedron out there. There is this one by a bloke called Chris that WAS on a Czech tech site, but for some reason has been taken down recently.

There are others. This one (not very convincing) has been constructed from measurements (also "protected data" PAS?) of one found in Tongeren, in the Gallo-Roman Museum, Tongeren. This nice-looking one is a metal cast made from a  mould that was either created from a scan or a constructed model. A less nice one, 3-d printed. A London Museum resin cast one is nice-looking but sold out. And so on... somebody has gone to a lot of trouble to make these and in my view, it is not as easy as it looks at first sight.

I really see nothing wrong with this. As we saw in the first post, certain people in archaeology seem to think (IMO, wrongly) that it is really  jolly good to get the grockles guessing "what this mystery object that has archaeologists baffled could be".  They can do it from pictures of course, or much more effectively they could have a 3d printout in their hand to heft, look at from different angles, squint through the holes, poke things into the holes and so on. Nothing like hands-on experience. Now this is what PAS-gatekeepers want to restrict. First they encourage "public involvement" (GUESS WOT THIS IS!!??), then they add, "yes, but only in the way WE tell you you can". 

I wish they'd apply the same approach to digging holes in sites to hoik out collectable artefacts, somehow the PAS can't seem to do that.