[OSM-talk] Illegal activity

[Anthony]

On Fri, Oct 30, 2009 at 11:17 AM, Peteris Krisjanis <pecisk at gmail.com> wrote:
> Photo can be and *is* copyright subject

Some photos are.  Not all photos are, at least not in all jurisdictions.

For instance, in the United States, a photograph of an out of
copyright 2-dimensional work of art is generally not copyrightable.

A satellite photo, being taken from so far away, is pretty close to
2-dimensional.  Aerial photos taken from aircraft, less so.

And a photo which is actually a composite of multiple photos
(infrared, greyscale, and color, for instance), might be argued to
have that slight bit of creative input needed to make it
copyrightable.

Anyway, there certainly is grey area over even that.

> Grey area is - is tracing over sat/ortphotos creation of derative works, or not?

That's equivalent to the question of whether or not that aspect of the
original work is copyrighted.  Tracing a copyrighted work is certainly
copying, and copying is the key necessary condition for the creation
of a derivative work.

> I know it is frustrating and sometimes people want to do that in
> spite, but this won't help anyone, especially OSM.

In my opinion the rules need to be relaxed a bit.  There's nothing
wrong with copying facts from other sources, so long as you're careful
to only copy facts, and so long as the amount and substantiality is
kept low.  I was somewhat amazed that my question as to whether or not
I can use Google Street View to check whether or not a left hand turn
is allowed at a certain intersection was met with a certain number of
"no" answers.

I don't know how it is in other parts of the world, but here in the
US, copying facts from other sources without infringing on the
copyright of those sources, is exactly how you're taught to write a
work of non-fiction.

I can certainly sympathize with "I should have kept quiet like
everyone else" when it comes to stuff like that.  But outright
tracing?  That leaves too much room to get caught.  If you're going to
"keep quiet like everyone else", at least do it the right way.  Look
at multiple independent sources.  Take notes from those sources.  Then
make your own work from your memory and your notes.  Just like you're
making a research paper.

But no, don't actually do that.  It's unfair to the people who spent
all that time riding around on their bicycles making GPS traces.

Anthony