[OSM-legal-talk] License Cut-over and critical mass

[Rob Myers]

On 07/16/2010 04:32 PM, Anthony wrote:
>
> Making an offer still requires that you have the database available in
> some sort of distributable form.  And keep it around indefinitely.  It's
> a big burden to carry around while designing your system.  Just look how
> long it took OSM to offer a copy of the entire history database - and
> arguably they haven't even offered everything.

Ah. The lack of a timeout is a bug. :-( I should have spotted that. :-(

> When I design a system to use OSM data I don't want to have to worry
> about how I'm going to maintain the database in a form which I can
> distribute to meet the requirements of the license.  Frankly, I'll pass
> on the use of the data if I have to maintain such an onerous
> requirement.  I'll get the data from somewhere else.  Or I'll just use
> the data and ignore the ODbL, since it likely isn't enforceable anyway.

Do you have a write-up of your opinion of the ODbL's enforceability 
anywhere (I'm sorry if I've missed this before)?

> It absolutely has precedents.  And it absolutely is *not* a requirement
> of CC-BY-SA.  So don't try to imply that ODbL is basically CC-BY-SA for
> data.  It isn't.It's more like GPL for data.

It is similar in intent to BY-SA, as sharealike is not copyleft. But the 
material differences are clearly more important than I had considered, 
so I will address this differently in future.

> Only with much less
> usage so much less certainty over exactly what it means.

Yes that's a fair criticism.

- Rob.