[Talk-GB] Using store locator as source

[OpenStreetmap HADW]

On 15 September 2013 22:24, Dave F. <davefox at madasafish.com> wrote:
> On 15/09/2013 21:41, OpenStreetmap HADW wrote:
>>
>> I'm pretty sure that store locators pages on chain store web sites are
>> not safe sources, but can someone confirm this.
>
>
> What do mean by "safe"? Inaccurate? Unlawful?

Likely to be an infringement of the operator's copyrights (a store
locator will have database rights, like a map), and if a map had
actually been used from the site, which seems unlikely in this case,
of the rights in the map (store locators often have rather better maps
than the Bing one used in this case).  If it is OK to use store
locators, I can see people exporting all the big name store locators
into the map.
>
> There's nothing really wrong with the closed polygon that can't be fixed by

These are side issues.  The issue I was consulting on here was the
copyright one.

> removing the building tag. The mapper's clearly used the Bing aerial
> background imagery to trace the area & used Asda's website for other data.
> Seeing the car park originates from '09, I'm going to guess the supermarket
> polygon was expanded from a POI. I can't think of any data being more

I can't remember.  However the current mapper has left at least two
POIs behind when they have mapped buildings, so I have a feeling it
wasn't mapped at all.  Also, I seem to remember thinking about mapping
this myself, but holding back because I would have had to use the weak
source, local_knowledge, to identify it as Asda, so I would have
wanted to re-visit it on the ground, first.  The reasons I didn't just
remove building=yes were:

- I felt uncomfortable about building on something that might have
come from a copyright map (I was half expecting a usable map of the
site on Asda's web site);

- the site outline is wrong.  It takes in a health centre and
community centre and some blocks of flats  that are not part of the
Asda site - I felt getting that right was something for another day;

- getting the mapper to fix it would be more likely to avoid the same
mistake being made again, and get them to fix their other instances -
I know of at least one other with the building tag on a site

Incidentally, the building tag may be an Id issue.  JOSM doesn't set
building by default on shops.

> accurate than the operator's web page. I'm not sure why you so concerned
> about this instance. Nothing in OSM is completely accurate. If you know ways
> to improve the data, do so.

However, the accuracy is a side issue, that can be handled offline.
My concern is about the principle of whether store locators are a
special case of a database that is exempt from the normal rule about
not importing databases, even piecemeal.  If they are, I would expect
a source code of something like "store_locator", rather than the full
URL, or, if the full URL for that store were visible on geographic
site, simply "website".

(In this case, I suspect the real sources were survey (by eye, not
GPS), Bing, and then only using the web site for phone numbers,
website and address.  Although they didn't have opening hours at all,
those should have been available on site.)

(What made me look at it was that it was local and had no changeset comment.)