[OSM-talk] Ordnance Survey tries to reinforce its strangleholdover "derived" geographic data in the UK

[Andy Robinson (blackadder-lists)]

Donald Allwright wrote:
>Sent: 20 November 2008 12:59 PM
>To: David Earl; osm
>Subject: Re: [OSM-talk] Ordnance Survey tries to reinforce its
>strangleholdover "derived" geographic data in the UK
>
>
>>From today's Guardian:
>>
>>http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/nov/20/ordnance-survey-google-
>maps <http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/nov/20/ordnance-survey-
>google-maps>
>>
>>(not reference to OpenStreetMap towards the end).
>>
>>and the letter from OS which provoked it:
>>
>>http://www.freeourdata.org.uk/docs/use-of-google-maps-for-display-and-
>promotion.pdf <http://www.freeourdata.org.uk/docs/use-of-google-maps-for-
>display-and-promotion.pdf>
>>
>>David
>
>This move is quite concerning, but underlines the need for OpenStreetMap to
>exist in the first place. I wonder if we should respond with some sort of
>marketing campaign, aimed at local authorities and other public
>institutions, to encourage them to use OpenStreetMap as the basis for their
>future mapping needs. 

Absolutely, especially for those places that are "complete". Those of us in
Birmingham will be prodding many groups locally, including the enormously
bureaucratic Birmingham City Council once we have finished the first phase,
which we hope to have done by Christmas [1] 


>In fact we should maybe even offer to complete
>surveys in a particular area of any types of data that are incomplete but
>which are important for the public good. One that particularly interests me
>at the moment is public rights of way. It's tempting to look at an OS map
>for public rights of way information before walking it and mapping it,
>however if we are mapping what we see on the ground then this shouldn't be
>necessary. 

The problem here is who says it's a public right of way. If you ask your
local authority they will bring out there plans which give the details and
reference numbers but these of course exist on OS mapping. Not easy to be
definitive.

>Should a public institution express an interest in information
>on public rights of way in a particular square then I'd be more than happy
>to help collect it from the marked paths found on the ground. We could
>start by creating a section on the wiki providing details of how public
>institutions might approach the subject, and a means for conveying suitable
>requests to the community. Of course commercial companies might want to do
>this too, and although some people might have reservations about this, they
>are free to make donations to help OSM out!

Wiki is a good idea to pool information, though I still think direct action
with local authorities is the way to go. The more they know about OSM the
better the chance they have of considering alternative solutions when a map
related task or public service comes up.


>
>I'm reminded of how the Linux Kernel developers made an offer to hardware
>manufacturers a couple of years back to write drivers for them, all they
>had to do was ask and provide the necessary information/documentation. From
>what I've read this has been very successful campaign. If we as members of
>the OSM community can get a good reputation for responding to requests for
>particular types of information in the same way, then the OS will either
>become an irrelevance or will have to change its licensing policies.
>
>Donald



Cheers

Andy