[Talk-GB] OS OpenData Licence update (WAS: Finding Unmapped public rights of way)

Robert Whittaker (OSM lists) robert.whittaker+osm at gmail.com
Tue Jul 30 11:11:09 UTC 2013


On 30 July 2013 10:49,  <osm at k3v.eu> wrote:
> I agree with Rob 100% on this, it is pretty obvious that the Government
> intends for this data to be freely usable by businesses and projects
> like OSM. This has been covered to death a number of times in the past.
>
> There is a lot of external data in OSM that requires attribution. The way
> the project handles that seems to work pretty well regardless of what
> the amateur lawyers may say.
>
> It is very hard to imagine the circumstances where OSM would face any
> issues from using these datasets and if that were to occur then the
> data can be removed as has happened when other data sources have been
> challenged in the past.
>
> If you don't want to use this data in OSM then don't use it but you are
> not the arbiter deciding what others may do.

No, but then neither are you. But I do care about this project and I
feel that it's important that contributors are properly informed.

Where a license that some data is offered under is known to be
incompatible with OSM's license (currently the ODbL), I fail to see
how anyone can knowingly make use of that data and still comply with
the statement they agreed to in the OSM contributor terms:

"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."

I would agree with you that the chances of OS taking action over this
are rather slim. But while we do have the ability to delete infringing
data after the fact, as we have seen, that can be a somewhat painful
process, resulting in the loss of more than just the infringing data.
However, those two points are pretty irrelevant as far as I can tell.
OS says their licence is incompatible with the ODbL, and each mapper
has agreed to only add contents which can legally be re-distributed
under the ODbL. Nowhere does it say that individual mappers can take
it upon themselves to add contents where OSMF is unlikely to be sued
for violating a licence. The only option I see is for you to argue
that OS is wrong in its interpretation of its own licence. But the
effort that ODUG is putting in to explaining the problems with the OS
OpenData Licence, and pressuring OS to change, would seem to
contradict this.

Robert.

-- 
Robert Whittaker



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