[OSM-talk] OSM license change: A license to kill? -> How to make a nightmare come true!

[Nop]

Hi!

Martijn van Oosterhout schrieb:
 > Out of curiosity, what would have been better? The licence has been
 > recognised to be a problem for years, it was known well before I
 > joined. It's been discussed at almost every OSM meeting I've been at.
 > But you're right, we didn't plaster a huge banner on the front page
 > advertising it because frankly that would be pointless. How many
 > people knew wikipedia had a licence problem before they changed?

No idea, never been into wikipedia. But I can assure you that you can be 
with OSM for 6 months, consider yourself rather active, be subscribed to 
talk, talk-de and the forum and visit the local OSM meetings without 
ever getting any hint to that licence business.

 > I thought there was a message added while creating an account along
 > the line of "the data is under CC-BY-SA but may be changed at some
 > later date". hmm, looks like that never happened, oh well.
 >
 > I'm just wondering what kind of notification would have been
 > appropriate for you.

Actually, I think the attempt to convince 100000 people to cooperate is 
an awe-inspiring task to me. At work, I usually don't have to convince 
more than 50 people of something not all will agree with and that is 
something I already consider difficult. So it merits some work.

I guess a good strategy would have been:

1. Provide some background information and keep it current
- the problems with the current licence
- the intention of the new licence
- the current state of the process
- and later the wording of the licence

2. Provide translations of this in the major languages. Most people 
speak English to some degree, but some don't and something of this 
importance and with so much legalese involved does need to be in your 
native language to be sure you understood it. Keep translations current, 
also.

3. Define a way for feedback from the community. Maybe some unoffical 
votes would have given an impression on how well a particular idea would 
have worked.

4. Mail an announcement to every member of OSM when you start and when 
there is significant progress, linking the information pages. One every 
few months would have been enough. This would have given those people 
who are interested a chance to get informed and either get involved or 
be satisfied with what they read. Most people would ignore those mails 
but feel informed rather than surprised.

5. Give people plenty of time to react.


Actually I am worried. You may have noticed that there are many 
complaints, and also hostile reactions and suspicions voiced. And I bet 
you that still most OSM members have no idea that anything is going on, 
because they do mapping and not mailing lists. You have only seen the 
peak of the iceberg. But that still gives the foundation the chance to 
get something right. I am in favor of the new licence. But I don't 
believe it can be done by April. The only thing that can be achieved by 
April is splitting or breaking OSM apart.

bye
	Nop