[OSM-legal-talk] Google Maps UK - some legal angles

[Richard Fairhurst]

As posted on talk-gb, Google Maps appear to have switched to using their 
own data rather than Tele Atlas's in the UK this morning.

This raises a couple of interesting points.

Firstly, it seems pretty clear to me that some of the data is OS-derived 
(probably from OpenData or a commercial licence - this isn't an 
accusation of wrongdoing!). The water bodies have the same shape. Rural 
woods are given names - information that can be derived from OS and 
pretty much nowhere else, unless you actually go round and talk to some 
very old residents. But even then I'm sure that 99% of people in our 
town wouldn't know the names of most of the woods.

The copyright notice is now "Map data (c) 2011 Google". The OS 
attribution is two clicks away and fairly well hidden. Why that matters 
to us: it's a pretty obvious precedent that an NMA is happy with that 
kind of attribution in a large, aggregated dataset, even for significant 
use of their data. Or at least I think so.

Secondly, though, I am still bemused as to where some of the data comes 
from. As an example, if you search for 'High Lodge, East End', you get a 
cottage at the edge of the Blenheim Palace estate. But it's not High 
Lodge; that's well within the estate.

I can't see anywhere obvious in the usual data sources, let alone on the 
ground, to give the impression this is High Lodge. Any thoughts?

(I'm sure there isn't any OSM data in there, but someone may, of course, 
prove me wrong!)

Finally, there are _lots_ of roads that look like normal roads, but are 
clearly tagged within Google's database as restricted access. You can 
route over them, but you get a warning - "This route has restricted 
usage or private roads" - and each direction is subtitled with "Partial 
restricted usage road" or somesuch. Will this be enough when someone 
drives down one and gets shot by the farmer? And are there any 
exceptions where a rutted track/precipitous drop isn't marked as such?

cheers
Richard