[Tagging] [OT] Licensing of information from websites

[Dan S]

2015-03-31 12:51 GMT+01:00 Andrew Guertin <andrew.guertin at uvm.edu>:
>> I wonder that nobody so far did spell out a warning about adding
>> information from websites. The simple key website=* is ok, but every
>> information like address, prizes and all the amenities is most of the
>> time not usable due to license problems.
>>
>> cu fly
>
>
> I'm pushing this offtopic and this discussion should probably go to
> legal-talk (I've set reply-to there), but that paragraph does not match my
> understanding of copyright law (IANAL, etc.).
>
> My understanding is that a piece of information like an address or phone
> number is a fact and is ineligible for copyright protection. If the fact has
> been collected into a database, though, the database is in some countries
> eligible for protection under a separate form of IP.
>
> Thus if you go to a business' website to find their phone number and put it
> in OSM, everything is okay, but if you go to a phone book to find it, that's
> not okay and you could impact use of OSM in jurisdictions that have database
> protections.

Andrew, you are correct. People who are concerned about licensing do
forget this distinction sometimes. You've described it very well (the
difference between copying a phone number and a phone book)

Best
Dan