[OSM-legal-talk] Licenses for Produced Works under ODbL

[Jonathan Harley]

(After a hiatus - I've been discussing this off-list with Anthony and 
others.)

On 22/10/12 23:13, Anthony wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 22, 2012 at 4:49 PM, Martin Koppenhoefer
> <dieterdreist at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2012/10/22 Jonathan Harley <jon at spiffymap.net>:
>>> Anyway, the ODbL is explicit that an image is an example of a produced work,
>>> so for anyone creating them, their responsibility is clear: include the
>>> notice required for produced works.
>>>
>>> It's also explicit that a produced work is not a derivative database (4.5b),
>>> so it follows that a map image does not have to be licensed using ODbL. So,
>>> the hypothetical person wishing to publish on a stock art website only has
>>> to decide whether they wish to impose ODbL or some other restriction on
>>> their work, or not. Not imposing any restrictions on an image is clearly
>>> allowed. (In which case a database derived from the image would not be bound
>>> by ODbL.)
>>
>> Then this is clearly a loophole. You could render (with a dedicated
>> style) the whole world in a very high zoom level (even as raster, if
>> you're in doubt whether vectors might fall under ODbL), apply image
>> recognition on it (would be simple if you used one rendered layer per
>> feature) and reassemble the whole database. I am simplifying this
>> process, but it is clearly possible.
> This (both Jonathan's comment and your response) confuses copyright
> law.  Yes, you don't have to release a Produced Work under ODbL.  But
> if you don't have a license on the Produced Work, then all rights are
> reserved.
>

Only *if* copyright is there at all. What is in question is whether a 
substantial amount of material that is OSM's copyright is present in a 
map I make using OSM's data. If it isn't, then it follows that OSM 
cannot reserve any rights in my work, explicitly or otherwise.

To recap, OSM does not assert database rights on a produced work such as 
a map image, so only copyright is in question.

One thing that's confusing me, is that 
http://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright does not say what license applies 
to the contents. ODbL specifically says that it only applies to the 
database and a separate license is required for the contents. It 
suggests that a notice should be inserted "prominently in all relevant 
locations" which surely includes the copyright wiki page.

I remember earlier discussions on this list about using ODcL for the 
contents. Was this what was agreed on? LWG, anyone?


J.

-- 
Dr Jonathan Harley   :    Managing Director    :   SpiffyMap Ltd

md at spiffymap.com      Phone: 0845 313 8457     www.spiffymap.com
The Venture Centre, Sir William Lyons Road, Coventry CV4 7EZ, UK