2014 NEC free PDF access

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Since I am long retired and this, shall we say, "verbose" forum is enough to drive me back to all my former wives, I shall enter and depart this forum as quickly as possible lest I get even grumpier than I am.

I have the full 2011 NFPA 70, 879 page, 10.6 MB PDF format, on my computer.

I have no idea where I freely downloaded it from but it was in June of 2011.

Point is, if you look around on the interwebs, who knows what you might find.
 
Smart $ said:
Does the 2014 NEC pdf need the security plugin that the 2011 NEC pdf required?
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I don't think so, or else my pdf viewer has it. What they did when I bought it was you identify the name of the person it is licensed to. Then they create a document just for you with a copyright statement and who it is licensed to on every page. Their terms of use are not clear, as you're not allowed to copy it or put it more than one machine. But I do backups of my machine, and saw no provision for that.... And what happens if my computer disk dies and I want it elsewhere?

There is nothing keeping you from putting on another computer except for the license agreement and the end users choice to comply with that. This seems like a good solution, as I think you should be allowed to use it on as many devices as you want as long as it is YOU who's using it. Kind of like carrying the book around with you, although you can loan the book to someone else and you can't do that with the pdf -- only a paper printed copy can be circulated and used by others.
 
g3guy said:
Since I am long retired and this, shall we say, "verbose" forum is enough to drive me back to all my former wives, I shall enter and depart this forum as quickly as possible lest I get even grumpier than I am.

I have the full 2011 NFPA 70, 879 page, 10.6 MB PDF format, on my computer.

I have no idea where I freely downloaded it from but it was in June of 2011.

Point is, if you look around on the interwebs, who knows what you might find.
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I am sorry you feel that way. I have read the thread 3 times and it is still unclear what you are trying to do. Your title states 2014 yet you keep talking about the 2014.

Are you having trouble with the 2011??? on your windows 8. If so there may be a conflict with the newer versions of adobe - there is a fix but I believe you will have to call nfpa. Then were very helpful to me when I had issues with adobe versions.
 
Smart $ said:
The NFPA online version of the NEC is presented in RealRead, a Java-based document viewer comparable to viewing scanned pages.

If you've updated to the most current Java software (Version 7 Update 51), security settings will block it. You have to open the Java Control Panel (Configure Java, in Java folder of traditional All Programs; typically C:\Program Files\Java\jre7\bin\javacpl.exe). Under the Security tab, in the Exception Site List, you'll have to add...
Code: 
http://rrdocs.nfpa.org/
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Thanks for the info. I was able to access it after I did what you posted. Thanks to everyone who responded.
 
infinity said:
Can you download to more than one device?
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If it really is a PDF, it should not be locked to one device. If it is a locked PDF which requires a special reader (although hopefully not as hopeless as RealRead) or an App then they could lock it to a limited number of devices.
But you might have to move it yourself after downloading it one time.
 
infinity said:
In many cases they're required to provide free access by law but no one said that they have to make it easy. Like other industries bent on preventing piracy the legitimate user gets it in the end.
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yep. it's like the public beach access required by law in places like malibu.

if you go about a mile down the road, there is a place for three cars to park,
and if you follow the path thru the poison sumac that was planted there,
you can schlep your beach chair back up here and enjoy the view.

enjoy your public beach, now.

my personal thoughts on the NFPA marketing strategy is they wouldn't have
to charge eleventeen hundred dollars for a code book if they quit sending me
$300 a year in snail mail postage, to get me to buy something i'm never going to buy.

i've never seen so much spam from anywhere outside of Nigeria in my life.
 
Fulthrotl said:
....................my personal thoughts on the NFPA marketing strategy is they wouldn't have
to charge eleventeen hundred dollars for a code book if they quit sending me
$300 a year in snail mail postage, to get me to buy something i'm never going to buy.

i've never seen so much spam from anywhere outside of Nigeria in my life.
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NFPA: National Forest Prevention Agency.
 
infinity said:
I'm not advocating pirating but it's because of roadblocks like these that people resort to piracy in the first place.
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Who says it's pirating to get a free copy of the Code? The code is the law. So 2014 is not legal to download for free yet but 2011 is fair game. AFAIK the last case regarding this issue is still Veeck v. Southern Building Code Congress Int'l, Inc.

Has anybody been forced to pay NFPA by the courts since this decision?
 
ASG said:
Who says it's pirating to get a free copy of the Code? The code is the law. So 2014 is not legal to download for free yet but 2011 is fair game. AFAIK the last case regarding this issue is still Veeck v. Southern Building Code Congress Int'l, Inc.

Has anybody been forced to pay NFPA by the courts since this decision?
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I don't think it is quite that simple. NEC/NFPA is not the law, they create a document that jurisdictions decide to adopt as the law. If anything you should be able to ask the AHJ for a free copy since it is the law. But NPFA is nothing more than a private organization that publishes a book and like any other book publishers they expect to sell their products. NFPA does grant AHJ's the right to use their publication as an adopted law though, which makes it complicated and even an attorney probably can not tell you why it works the way it does, at least in a way that makes any sense.
 
kwired said:
I don't think it is quite that simple. NEC/NFPA is not the law, they create a document that jurisdictions decide to adopt as the law. If anything you should be able to ask the AHJ for a free copy since it is the law. But NPFA is nothing more than a private organization that publishes a book and like any other book publishers they expect to sell their products. NFPA does grant AHJ's the right to use their publication as an adopted law though, which makes it complicated and even an attorney probably can not tell you why it works the way it does, at least in a way that makes any sense.
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AHJs are not required to hand out free copies of the Code. At most, they must provide you with access to it. This usually means having a copy available in their office for you to go in and look at.
 
ASG said:
Who says it's pirating to get a free copy of the Code? The code is the law. So 2014 is not legal to download for free yet but 2011 is fair game. AFAIK the last case regarding this issue is still Veeck v. Southern Building Code Congress Int'l, Inc.

Has anybody been forced to pay NFPA by the courts since this decision?
Click to expand...

NFPA, ASME, and some other entity are currently suing a website that provides downloadable copies of some of their standards. See http://www.nfpa.org for a video, copy of the complaint. NFPA want to protect the creative content of the standards, that they acquired from volunteers like me, and is a major revenue stream for them (70% NFPA income is from sales of pubs and licensing).

NFPA claims that their free online reading site for scanned copies of the standards (without copying possible, more or less) meets the requirement of text adopted into law being freely available.

I'm on both sides of this:

1) nearly all of my income came from software development, which is all intellectual property.
2) I have a hope (probably misguided) that if the code in a useable form were freely available, maybe more people would actually follow it.

It also means that I can't make what I consider to be a better format available without considerable licensing negotiation and hassle, and probable royality payments.
 
kwired said:
I don't think it is quite that simple. NEC/NFPA is not the law, they create a document that jurisdictions decide to adopt as the law. If anything you should be able to ask the AHJ for a free copy since it is the law. But NPFA is nothing more than a private organization that publishes a book and like any other book publishers they expect to sell their products. NFPA does grant AHJ's the right to use their publication as an adopted law though, which makes it complicated and even an attorney probably can not tell you why it works the way it does, at least in a way that makes any sense.
Click to expand...

Once adopted, it has the force of law, and needs to be available, for free, to anyone.

Lawyers are not allowed to copyright their submissions to courts, although they are probably some of the most expensive, per page, documents being created.

The US government is forbidden, I think by the Constitution, from copyrighting any documents they produce (although they hedge this with agreements with contractors who produce documents and the US Military is currently working on a contract with a private firm to digitize much of their material that the government could not copyright, but would allow the private firm to control access to the product, stealing from the US citizens materials oor tax money paid for creating).

States and smaller entities are allowed to copyright their works. They are not allowed to copyright laws and regulations.
 
480sparky said:
AHJs are not required to hand out free copies of the Code. At most, they must provide you with access to it. This usually means having a copy available in their office for you to go in and look at.
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Was worth a shot:cool:

jxofaltrds said:
NFPA needs to quit complaining. If the NEC was not codified no one would buy the thing. They should re-think this.
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If NEC is required to be free because it is adopted as law, how is NFPA supposed to fund the continuing development and new editions? They are in same boat with many other publications they make.

I don't really know how this works, but at same time we can go to our constitution of the United States and look at it in somewhat the same way. Is it free? Kind of. Can a private publishing company put it into print and distribute it for a fee? I think so. How many school textbooks have the Constitution printed in them and were purchased by someone (usually the school districts)?

One thing about the NEC that is different though is the source (NFPA) is a private company.

I don't really know exactly how State laws usually work either, I don't think here in NE that the entire NEC document is on record anywhere in the law journals, it is merely referenced in those journals. Every time we start on a new code the Legislature needs to introduce a bill to have that reference changed and it has to pass through proper legislation like any other bill before it becomes a law, but the only thing that changes is the reference to which edition of NEC is the law - and if there are any amendments (we currently don't have any but have in the past) I believe are also not in the journal- but a reference to where those amendments are found is in there.
 
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