[Imports] Microsoft Buildings Import Inquiry

[Rory McCann]

On 14/02/2019 16:52, John Whelan wrote:
> By this definition any import of data that has as part of its process 
> each item added that the item is inspected visually using the todo list 
> is not an import.
> 
> There are a lot of building outlines that are being brought in in this 
> way currently.  Are they exempt from the import guidelines?

Perhaps I was too brief in my initial suggestion.

"Has this piece of data been specifically checked by an OSMer"

Means you must:

  * Download existing surrounding OSM data
  * Check it against aerial imagery that it's good.
  * Possibly merge existing buildings
  * Possibly merge existing address points
  * Possibly merge existing PoIs
  * Possibly adjust nearby roads, landuse, etc

Just pressing ] 1,000 times in 10 minutes doesn't count. You have to 
*actually* look at it, and manually "approve" it, to OSM standards. If 
you do it lots, and get tired/brain-mushy then that doesn't count 
either. This approach does limit how much you can add.

On 14/02/2019 21:49, Christoph Hormann wrote:
> If you ask the mapper why they chose a particular tag or created a
> particular geometry and they do not explain this with a particular
> observation in reality or in an image source but ...

This aligns with what I said IMO. "The mapper must approve it by OSM 
standards". If you add some data, you need to have grounds for it *by 
normal OSM mapping standards*. Which is local knowledge, aerial or survey.

The Microsoft building outline dataset is very simple, containing only 
the outline of the building. No address, no height, no building type. no 
name. It can be (and was) derived 100% from aerial imagery. IMO if 
someone loads that up, and manually approves each building, then that 
(IMO) is much less of an import.

Obviously this is just *my* opinion.

On 14/02/2019 17:49, Martin Koppenhoefer wrote:
> I believe this is too simplistic, it ignores the copyright aspect

On 14/02/2019 21:15, Andy M wrote:
> The main purposes of import policies are related to both licensing
review as well as ...

Perhaps I was unclear, my suggested rule assumed the data licence was 
acceptable. It's never OK to add tainted data, whether it's an import, 
or from visually copying from something like Google Maps. The imports@ 
list is very helpful for data licensing advice. If you have a new 
source, asking that list can be very useful.