[Imports] kartverket imports to OpenStreetMap

[Frederik Ramm]

Dear kart at nuug.no readers,
(Cc to imports at openstreetmap.org)

   I am writing to you in my role as a member of the OSMF Data Working
Group. Our job is to watch out for vandalism, mapping disputes,
copyright violations, and problematic imports.

It is the last of these that I'm writing to you about. A number of
different users have conducted imports from "kartverket" data sets in
the recent past. Many of these imports had technical problems - e.g.
changesets filled with 50,000 nodes and thus very difficult to handle,
or often we can see that people first imported something and then
deleted half of it again, and so on.

Importing is a difficult process and you can easily make a lot of
mistakes. That's why we request that any import is discussed before it
is conducted, so that experienced data importers can have a look at the
plans.

While I have been told that this particular import has been discussed on
this list, it seems that either there were not enough experienced
importers on this list, or they have not succeeded in making sure that
this import runs smoothly. Also, the data that could potentially be
imported seems to be on a scale that warrants wider discussion.

I must ask everyone to stop importing any data from the kartverket data
set for now. Please read and follow the guidelines linked from
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Import (e.g. note the points about
separate accounts for data imports), and discuss your import plans with
the wider community on the imports at openstreetmap.org list.

Among other things, we will want to understand:

* what data is scheduled for import
* how is that data converted to OSM - what tags etc.
* who does the imports - if it is a community import, how will you make
sure that people have enough local knowledge and technical knowledge to
do it right
* how will conflicts with existing data be handled

I know this might sound a bit like we're trying to spoil your fun - but
we aren't, we just want to make sure that the import is indeed a success
for everyone.

If we find that any individuals are importing kartverket data before the
required consultation on the imports@ list is over, we will remind them
of this. In severe cases we may have to revert an import gone wrong.

Thanks
Frederik

-- 
Frederik Ramm  ##  eMail frederik at remote.org  ##  N49°00'09" E008°23'33"