[OSM-legal-talk] What should be considered legal?

[rhn]

Matt Amos wrote:
> On 10/24/09, Martin Koppenhoefer <dieterdreist at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2009/10/21 rhn <opstmaac.rhn at porcupinefactory.org>:
>>> I'm a mapper for more than a year, and I know a little bit about
>>> intellectual property, but some questions have been puzzling me for quite
>>> some time.
>>>
>>> First of them - how much is allowed when referring to proprietary maps? Is
>>> it right to look at the street names to see whether I got them right? Or
>>> can I compare topology of the streets with the external map? See if I got
>>> the village placement right and adjust it?
>> IMHO (IANAL) you can always compare your map to others, but if the
>> don't match, you will not know, who's right, unless you recontroll.
> 
> i'd agree - it's OK to compare OSM to proprietary maps and use that to
> figure out where needs surveying. but it's not OK to take information
> from that proprietary map - if there is a difference then you'll have
> to go out and survey the difference.
> 
> so (imho) it wouldn't be OK to adjust village placement based on
> proprietary maps; if there's a difference you'd have to look at other
> allowable sources like Y! aerial imagery or out-of-copyright maps, or
> go out and survey it with a GPS.
> 
> cheers,
> 
> matt

Thanks. The reason I asked that was that I frequently forget where the GPS trace was taken - was it a road or a track, which village or whatever else. This usually happens in areas where OSM map is pitch white :) Yahoo maps aren't very helpful there either.

Cheers
rhn