[OSM-legal-talk] Someone already had a look at the Bing Terms of Use?

Rob Myers rob at robmyers.org
Mon Dec 6 10:46:17 GMT 2010


On 12/06/2010 10:18 AM, Andrew Harvey wrote:
>
> I suppose I don't mind if a license is technically invalid because of
> some obscure legal reason, I just think that the intent needs to be
> there, publicly, officially, and clearly stated on what they are okay
> with and what they aren't. I don't think the Bing people have clearly
> stated what they consider acceptable and what they don't.

You can use the Bing map tiles in OSM editors and contribute the results 
to OSM:

"Microsoft is pleased to announce the royalty-free use of the Bing Maps 
Imagery Editor API, allowing the Open Street Map community to use Bing 
Maps imagery via the API as a backdrop to your OSM map editors."

> Another potential problem I see with Bing is, as far as I could tell,
> this grant is only for OpenStreetMap. Does their permission extend to
> other people who then use the OSM database? I feel this needs to be
> made clear.

Once it's in the OSM DB, it's under OSM's control thanks to the CTs, so 
there are no downstream issues caused by the data coming from Bing.

- Rob.



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