[OSM-legal-talk] [OSM-newbies] Copyright for street names

[Nic Roets]

> If you do it for one or two places, and every other OSM contributor
> does the same, that's 20-40,000 extractions from a database (whether
> it be a paper phone book or an electronic one). That is "significant"
> and therefore an infringement of EU database right.

IANAL, but it does not feel like infringement to me. The phonebook
company is allowing each of those OSM contributors to access their
database. THEY printed all the copies. THEY set up the website to
answer a small number of requests to millions of individuals.