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

[Anthony]

On Mon, Jul 26, 2010 at 12:07 PM, Rob Myers <rob at robmyers.org> wrote:
> On 07/26/2010 04:29 PM, Anthony wrote:
>> But looking at the text of the license, I don't think you can do that.
>> ODbL Section 4.6 says "If You Publicly Use a Derivative Database or a
>> Produced Work from a Derivative Database, You must also offer to
>> recipients of the Derivative Database or Produced Work a copy in a
>> machine readable form..."  But that is incompatible with BY-SA, which
>> says that "You may not offer or impose any terms on the Work that alter
>> or restrict the terms of this License or the recipients' exercise of the
>> rights granted hereunder."  A produced work under BY-SA can be publicly
>> used without offering recipients the source database.  But a produced
>> work from an ODbL database cannot be publicly used without offering
>> recipients the source database.
>
> If you receive a produced work under BY-SA you just have to maintain the
> attribution explaining where to get the database used to create the produced
> work (ODbL 4.3).

Where are you given permission to copy and distribute the produced
work without following the terms of ODbL.  (Alternatively, where does
the ODbL give you permission to copy and distribute the produced work
without following 4.6.)  Remember, copyright and database laws default
to "all rights reserved" barring a license to the contrary.

> So there are two parallel distribution and derivation graphs, of the
> ODbL-licenced databse and the (sometimes) BY-SA licenced works. Neither
> interferes with the rights granted under the other.

That's not how licenses work.  By default you have no rights.  A
license *grants* rights.  The only way for the derived work (i.e. the
produced work) to be under BY-SA is if the rights holder grants a
license under BY-SA.

>> that.  If the data can be used in a produced work under BY-SA, then the
>> data has to be BY-SA.
>
> No it doesn't. That's why there is such a thing as a produced work in
> contrast to a derivative work.

That may be the reasoning, but it doesn't work.

Consider the LGPL.  If I have software under CC-BY-SA, and I want to
include an LGPL library, can I do it?  No.  Not because I'm violating
the LGPL, but because I'm violating CC-BY-SA.

Incidentally, that's why the LGPL explicitly gives permission to
relicense the work under GPL.  Otherwise, LGPL wouldn't be compatible
with GPL.