[OSM-talk] [Announce] OSMF license change vote has started

[Kai Krueger]

Ulf Lamping wrote:

...

> 
> So this is a well designed and manufactured gun still heading at the 
> mappers head - to keep the picture.

No, it is not actually a gun to your head, as a gun is rather lethal. 
However the data of people who have not initially agreed to is not 
deleted for ever but still available in the old planet. It just no 
longer gets exported with the ODbL licensed data. So if at any point in 
the future you decided you do agree to the ODbL you can easily move your 
data back in. And I am sure every effort will be made to make this as 
simple as possible.

So even if you initially say no and make your voice heard, nothing will 
be lost and the decision can be changed afterwards, so no real loss to 
you to saying no, other than perhaps causing a headache to all those who 
have spent a lot of time making it a good license.

But what would be the alternative? Given that the licenses are 
incompatible to each other, even though as close as possible in spirit, 
I don't see much alternative to asking everyone "Do you agree / Do you 
not agree, at which point if _the overwhelming majority agree_ you get 
the chance to reconsider and if not unfortunately there is no other 
option than to move the data out of the ODbL licensed database.

How is that in anyway different to a vote?


> 
> Maybe the OSMF / LWG should have *asked* the people involved the most - 
> the mappers?

Well, I think the OSMF and LWG have tried incredibly hard to ask the 
people involved and all the mappers. They have had a panel discussion 
with the lawyer authoring ODbL at State of the Map, they have regularly 
posted to legal-talk, osmf-talk to talk and talk-de (presumably also to 
other lists although I don't know), all through out the year(s) of work 
on the license change. At every point people could give feedback and 
many people outside of OSMF and the LWG did give valuable feedback that 
has been taken into account. However at some point (after years) one 
just needs to proceed, otherwise one will still be discussing every last 
dispute while the current license potentially breaks down in court when 
it gets challenged.


And should you have any actual concrete concerns about the license that 
haven't been addressed in all the discussions, supporting documentation 
or other information that has been produced to explain as carefully as 
possible why this change is needed and why it is the best current option 
for OpenStreetMap, then I am sure one of the more legally capable people 
  than my self here on the list we help explain the reasoning behind the 
change.

Kai

> 
> Regards, ULFL
> 
> 
> </div>