[OSM-legal-talk] Usage of ODbL

[Anthony]

On Fri, Oct 1, 2010 at 11:26 AM, Nakor <nakor.osm at gmail.com> wrote:
> Let me understand something. I thought the whole point of CT was to ease a
> future license change. If some data is imported under a special agreement
> then when such a license change happens this particular data cannot be
> migrated and possibly ruins efforts from contributor that modified that
> data. So what is the point of having the CT then?

It's easier to ask 5 people to relicense than it is to ask 50,000.
This is especially true if the special agreement is "we're probably
going to be fine with you relicensing in the future, barring a
fundamental change in the nature of OSMF which you promise us isn't
going to happen, but to protect ourselves from such a situation we
aren't willing to give you permission to do that relicensing until
that new license is actually written."

I mean, what if OSMF somehow comes to lose a huge lawsuit, and the
receiver of the bankrupt organization sells the license in order to
pay of the debtors?  If an organization had given "a worldwide,
royalty-free, non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable license to do any
act that is restricted by copyright over anything within the Contents,
whether in the original medium or any other", now they're screwed.
OTOH, if they merely had agreed "we're probably going to be fine with
you relicensing in the future, barring a fundamental change in the
nature of OSMF which you promise us isn't going to happen", they're
not (and, in fact, OSM, the project and not the organization, is
better off because of it).

Of course, as I've pointed out before, DbCL already contains the
language "The Licensor grants to You a worldwide, royalty-free,
non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable copyright license to do any act
that is restricted by copyright over anything within the Contents,
whether in the original medium or any other."  So getting rid of
clause 2 is irrelevant unless you also get rid of DbCL.