[Legal-general] Which approach would be the best to import data into PD database?

[Andy Allan]

On Sat, Nov 15, 2008 at 9:21 AM, Kari Pihkala <kari.pihkala at gmail.com> wrote:

> 2. Import data from OSM without SA contributed data
>   + only one data source
>   - quality of data cannot be improved
>   - holes in data (SA contributors)

I'm not sure what makes you think that any data you take from the
OpenStreetMap database could possibly not be covered by the CC-BY-SA
license. Everything that's in there is covered, no exceptions. The
planet file, for instance, is covered by the license - and it doesn't
say "CC-BY-SA some-of-it, other-bits PD". Neither does the API.

Now if a contributor (including bulk uploaders) is/are willing to
*also* put a copy of their data into the public domain, then you
should enquire from them to receive a copy of their data duly
licensed. Public Domain is not "viral"; for example just because vast
amounts of OSM data came from TIGER doesn't mean that any of that data
in OSM is still public domain.

Yet, (along with a million things on wikipedia supposedly in the
public domain) be aware that whilst some people may be willing to
state that their contributions are public domain, it doesn't
necessarily make it so. I could stick a little banner on my wiki page
saying "all my edits are in the public domain", but if I've been
deriving addressing data position from OSM street networks then it's a
derived work and I can no more make that data public domain than I can
my handwritten version of Harry Potter.

Cheers,
Andy