Organizations such as everyone that works on standards at ISO, IEEE, etc. Should they be free to read? Yes! How am I supposed to comply with a law I can read, but can't follow? But the government doesn't need to do everything. In fact, quite a few laws defer to "best industry practices".

Of course, but these organisations, even if private entities, will be paid by the government to conduct research and offer best practices and advice, so if the taxpayer is already paying for it....then it should be free to read - OP made it sound as if private organisations conducted research out of their own good will and therefore it was justified to charge the public for it.....which is fine, but not if the rules become law!

Today the government usually doesn't pay them. They fund themselves by selling paper and electronic copies of the code. The idea is that if you are designing some type of equipment, then you should help pay for the development of the code governing that equipment.

It maybe makes sense for esoteric things but not at all for common things (like the building and electrical codes covering all houses.

Edit: Sometimes private organizations did write the codes for their members and later the government notices that's what everybody is using and it's working, so make it the law of the land.

It's frustrating that the government doesn't step in to pay/fund on behalf of the public in situations like that. Standards organizations should want such a guaranteed income stream.

Right? This idea literally goes back to the Code of Hammurabi.

> If it's required by law, then it should be free to read.

Nobody really disagrees with that. Most of the codes are available in paper form in libraries.

Organizations like the ASME (https://www.asme.org/) write the codes and they do a pretty good job.

And in the year 2021, it is reasonable to expect similar access via the web.