[OSM-talk] OSM data in Google Earth

[Tom Carden]

On 18/12/06, Hakan Tandogan <hakan at gurkensalat.com> wrote:
>
> Thanks a lot, that was what I needed at just at the perfect time ;-)
>
> My computer is rendering for tiles at home, and I was about to print out a
> few of the rendered png's to compare it to a paper map to see which
> streets I would have to map but GE makes comparing the street
> information in OSM to "the real thing" much easier ;-)
>
> By the way, sort of legal question: If I "visually" compare the
> converted kml with the sattelite images GE is showing me, would this be
> an inappropiate use of GE imagery? Would that somehow compromise the CC
> Licence of the OSM data?
>

The position that most long-term OSM contributors have taken on this
is: please don't do this, it might compromise the CC License of the
OSM data.

If you use any source which does not permit derived works (paper map,
Google Earth, etc), and that source contains easter eggs (fake data)
to catch plagiarists, then at least *all* your data would have to be
removed and at worst OSM is open to legal action.

It sucks but this cautious approach has worked so far - and with
access to and permission to use Yahoo's satellite imagery the need to
use Google Earth will go away.  Before we had access to good satellite
imagery, the project relied on GPS traces collected by individuals for
exactly this reason.

Best,

Tom.