[OSM-legal-talk] Editing Derived Database Extracts and ODbL

[andrzej zaborowski]

On 21 May 2010 14:47, Oliver (skobbler) <osm.oliver.kuehn at gmx.de> wrote:
>>"Share-Alike: If you publicly use any adapted version of this database,
>>or works produced from an adapted database, you must also offer that
>>adapted database under the ODbL."
>>
>>(I am trusting/hoping the human readable terms match the legalese.)
>>
>>So...my question is: how _useful_ does the derived database have to be?
>>
>>Does the ODbL require any "usefulness" to diffs, or only that the
>>available  database materials exactly match any temporary database used
>>to create a produced work?
>
> The first question is if the adapted database needs be offered "actively" or
> "passively" (meaning on demand). I would assume that it only needs to be
> offered "on demand" when I try to assume the concept behind it: The
> intention is that if you add something to the source that is valuable for
> the community then the community should have the chance to integrate the
> addition also into the source. This will only happen if someone of the
> community is prepared to take the effort, which would require it to be of
> significant value.

Unfortunately the community won't be able to integrate any substantial
amount of data unless the author also accepted the Contributor Terms
which they don't have to do.

>
>>But, what if I do something really rude like remove all of the node IDs?
>>  The derived database might have some very useful properties, but it
>>will be a truly royal PITA to apply back to OSM.
>
> If you keep a relation to the node IDs then these must be handed out as
> well. If you have deleted the node IDs then it probably becomes a "Produced
> Work" but as long as it remains in a state where you can update the
> temporary database with more recent OSM data then this requires a link from
> the OSM IDs to your elements in the temporary database. The key question
> here is if the temporary database keeps a link to the OSM database and then
> this link must be provided as well.

I don't think this distinction of whether you can keep your database
updated or not is anywhere in the ODbL.  If it was the way you explain
it, it would be really easy to make a dataset containing all the
useful data and not bound by the limitations a Derived Work bears.
You could even generate a new Produced Work automatically every time
something changes in OpenStreetMap and never have to release your
additions.

Cheers