[OSM-legal-talk] ODbL comments from Creative Commons

[Rob Myers]

SteveC wrote:
>
> No I think there are some substantial issues, but they're inflated  
> because of the PoV.

I didn't have a chance to get to Science Commons while I was in Boston
last week but I did talk to various people who are Smarter Than Me (tm)
from the FSF and CC and none of them supported copyleft (actually
share-alike) on data. A couple mentioned John specifically.

I still do not entirely agree with them. But I am concerned that, even
if defending the freedom to use geodata against the problems that
Science Commons has chosen (for what they feel are good reasons) not to
address (EU DB right, US database copyright, contract law) is the right
thing to do, the ODbL may end up being ineffective. And that in
jurisdictions those problems do not apply, addressing them by creating
rights in order to give them away may end up being counter-productive.

The Creative Commons licences import strong Moral Rights and Copyright
to where they might not otherwise apply in law or in practice. The ODbL
has the danger of doing the same for Database Right.

And I am really, really worried about the contract element of the ODbL.
All it will take is one database dump of OSM left on a DVD on a bus in a
non-DB-right jurisdiction and that's it...

- Rob.

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