[OSM-legal-talk] [OSM-talk] ODbL vs CC-by-SA pros and cons

[Anthony]

On Wed, Sep 1, 2010 at 3:52 PM, andrzej zaborowski <balrogg at gmail.com> wrote:
> Also I don't see how CC-By-SA 3.0 explicitly does not apply to
> databases more than 2.0.  It explicitly applies to things like maps
> however (possibly this only means maps as images though)

Well, it explicitly applies to "a compilation of data to the extent it
is protected as a copyrightable work".  Which means it implicitly
doesn't apply to "a compilation of data to the extent it is not
protected as a copyrightable work".

The argument being made by some is that the OSM database consists
completely of the latter.  Some have even gone so far as to claim that
all databases consist completely of the latter.  I guess if you take
that position then you could say CC-BY-SA explicitly does not apply to
databases.

But it's quite a leap from "some databases (e.g. white pages) are
non-copyrightable in some jurisdictions" and "databases are
non-copyrightable".  In fact, I'd say it's quite plainly false.  If
some databases are copyrightable, then CC-BY-SA 3.0 does apply to some
databases.

(The very fact that CC-BY-SA 3.0 explicitly covers "a compilation of
data to the extent it is protected as a copyrightable work" surely
means that the drafters of CC-BY-SA 3.0 thought copyright does apply
to some databases.)

Whether or not the OSM database is such a database is more arguable.
Although I'd still say it most likely is copyrightable *to some
extent* (so CC-BY-SA 3.0 would apply *to some extent*).  There's a
paper on the copyrightability of electronic maps in the United States
at (http://homepages.law.asu.edu/~dkarjala/Articles/Jurimetrics1995.html).
 In the conclusion:

[quote]"Confusion" is the best description of the state of post-Feist
copyright protection of maps, especially digitized geographic
information systems.[/quote]