[OSM-legal-talk] Brazilian postal code database patent application in Germany apparently rejected

[Simon Poole]

IANAL

It seems as if whatever they tried to patent in Germany was actually
definitely rejected.

Notes:

- this does not imply that they failed elsewhere, YWHTPM to find that out.

- while patents can apply to the processing and use of OSM data and
potentially (by a long stretch of imagination) to data representation in
OSM, they are orthogonal to other IP and other commercial rights, aka
copyright, fair competition so on, which is typically the major concern
when considering use of third party datasets in OSM.

- in general you should not be using anything for which permission for
use in OSM is not clear, it is simply not worth it.

Simon



Am 11.03.2018 um 00:04 schrieb Fernando Trebien:
> Hello,
>
> In Brazil we're discussing the legality of mapping postal codes using
> official data sources and we've found formal communications from the
> Brazilian Post (EBCT) [1] saying that the organization has filed a
> patent on the database with German Patent Applicatations, reference
> number 10.346.551.0. I've found the application on DPMA's website [2],
> but I'm unfamiliar with the terminology, so I'd kindly like to ask you
> for some help interpreting what it says.
>
> Under "Procedural Data", an "Examination procedure" was started in
> 2010 and its "Legal/procedural status" was set to "Decision to reject
> has become final" in 2016. Does that mean that the application was
> rejected?
>
> [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correios
> [2] https://register.dpma.de/DPMAregister/pat/register?AKZ=103465510
>


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