[OSM-legal-talk] data derived from UK Ordnace Survey

[andrzej zaborowski]

On 16 June 2011 14:47, Robert Whittaker (OSM)
<robert.whittaker+osm at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 16 June 2011 09:55, Richard Fairhurst <richard at systemed.net> wrote:
>> Robert Whittaker wrote:
>>> A major purpose of the CTs is to ensure that all the data
>>> remaining in OSM is suitable for re-licensing under any "Free
>>> and Open" license without the need for further checks.
>>
>> No, that hasn't been the case since Contributor Terms 1.2 were proposed in
>> November 2010 and subsequently adopted.
>>
>> 1.2.x say: "If you contribute Contents, You are indicating that, as far as
>> You know, You have the right to authorize OSMF to use and distribute those
>> Contents under our _current_ licence terms" (my emphasis).
>
> I'm sorry, but I believe that you're mistaken here.
>
> Your interpretation of what you've quoted from clause 1(a) is correct,
> but there are additional requirements elsewhere in the CTs which go
> beyond this. In particular Clause 2 requires an extensive rights grant
> to OSMF, which would, in particular, give them the right (without any
> further checking of the source's requirements) to re-license your
> contributions under any "free and open" license. If you do not have
> the right to give this right to OSMF for all the contents you have
> contributed, then you are not able comply with the CTs, and therefore
> should not sign them. Nothing in clause 2 says that weaker clause 1
> must over-ride it (note that clause 2 specifically mentions that it is
> "Subject to Section 3 and 4 below" but contains no mention of section
> 1. So by default you have to comply with both clauses 1 and 2
> separately.)
>
> If OSMF / LWG intended to only require contributed data complied with
> the current license, then I believe they have made a mistake in the
> wording of clause 2. However I don't think they made a mistake, as
> there was an amendment to clause 2 in a previous draft of the CTs,
> which would have allowed contents based on third-party sources to be
> submitted without violating clause 2, but this was reverted in a later
> draft.
>
> Maybe LWG would care to comment here on what they intended, and what
> they believe the effect of the current CTs actually is.

I believe the LWG was planning to go the way Richard is describing
(and Richard even sent an email to the LWG in support of that) but
then, a short time before updating the Contributor Terms to the
current version (1.2.4?) they changed their mind and decided checking
license compatiblity on the OSMF side, while good for the users would
be too much burden for OSM.  So they went back to a mechanism that
ensures that the OSMF will be able to update to any contributors
approved free and open license.  I think the LWG stated something like
this in the minutes or even on the list.

If not then by my reading a lot of the heated discussion of the last
two months on these lists has been moot. (ha ha!)

Cheers