(1)

(A) "Firm" means a form of business entity that offers professional surveying services of its licensed personnel to the public.

(B) "Firm" does not include an individual licensee operating under his or her name;

(2) (A) "Land surveying" means a service comprising the:

(i) Determination of the location of land boundaries and land boundary corners; and

(ii) Preparation of:

(a) Plats showing the shape and areas of tracts of land and their subdivision into smaller tracts;

(b) Plats showing the location of streets, roads, and rights-of-way of tracts to give access to smaller tracts; and

(c) Official plats or maps of land thereof in this state.

(B) "Land surveying" does not include the measure of acreage of timber, cotton, rice, or other agricultural crops.

(C) A person practices or offers to practice land surveying if the person:

(i) Engages in land surveying for others; or

(ii) By verbal claim, sign, letterhead, card, telephone listing, or in any other way represents himself or herself:

(a) To be a professional surveyor; or

(b) As able to perform land surveying in this state;

(3) "Metadata" means a description of the content, ancestry and source, quantity, database schema, and accuracy of digital map data;

(4) "Professional surveyor" means a person who by reason of special knowledge of mathematics, surveying principles and methods, and legal requirements that are acquired by educational or practical experience is qualified to engage in the practice of land surveying and surveying measurement certification;

(5) "Responsible charge" means direct control of, supervision of, and legal responsibility for the surveying work performed; and

(6) "Surveying measurement certification" means providing the professional service of certification or sealing of maps, documents, digital files, or other data to verify that the maps, documents, digital files, or other data are authoritative professional determinations based on accepted methods and principles of surveying measurement or analysis representing or listing the following types of surveying measurements:

(A) The configuration or contour of the earth's surface or the position of fixed objects on the earth's surface;

(B) The position or elevation of a survey boundary, control monument, or reference point; and

(C) The alignment or elevation of a fixed work embraced within the practice of professional engineering.