[OSM-talk] offering adapted databases

David Groom reviews at pacific-rim.net
Sun Jul 10 20:27:49 BST 2011



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Anthony" <osm at inbox.org>
To: "OSM Fork" <osm-fork at googlegroups.com>; "openstreetmap" 
<talk at openstreetmap.org>
Sent: Friday, July 08, 2011 9:24 PM
Subject: [OSM-talk] offering adapted databases


>
> This is an except from a message I sent to Steve.  But hopefully
> someone can answer these questions for me (and for everyone who wants
> to comply with the ODbL):
>
> "If you publicly use any adapted version of this database, or works
> produced from an adapted database, you must also offer that adapted
> database under the ODbL."

You might be in luck.  I see you are quoting from the "human readable " 
summary of the ODbL, which is not an accurate summary of the actual licence. 
If you look at Clause 4.6 of the actual licence itself [1] you will see you 
have three choices either you have to offer

(I) the entire derivative database ; or
(ii) a file containing all of the alterations made to the Database; or
(iii) the method of making the alterations to the Database (such as an 
algorithm), including any additional Contents, that make up all the 
differences between the Database and the Derivative Database.

It may well be that option (iii) is best suited to you needs.

For instance say you produce a paper map from a planet file , it would seem 
you might comply with the spirit of the licence by stating which date planet 
file you used, and how that file was then used to produce any further 
derivative database that you used to produce the map.  I don't think this 
would comply with the letter of the licence, but is at least in the spirit 
of it.

>
> How long do I have to keep a copy of the adapted database in case
> someone takes me up on my offer?  How much of the database do I need
> to keep?  Is the offer valid to third parties?  If person A makes a
> bunch of tiles from a database, and person B prints out a map from
> those tiles and gives the map to person C, who offers person C the
> copy of the adapted database?  (Person B likely doesn't have a copy,
> but Person A would have to keep a ton of obsolete data indefinitely if
> his offer is valid to third parties.)
>

It would depend on who was making the tiles and the print outs "publicly 
available"  It is the person who makes the produced work publicly available 
who has to comply with clause 4.6.  So if A made the tiles publicly 
available he would have to comply, and if B printed out the map, and then 
made that map publicly available he would have to comply as well.

Regards

David

[1]  http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1.0/

> As of right now I have produced hundreds of thousands of tiles from a
> myriad of different versions of a myriad of different databases.  If
> someone asked me to give them a copy of the adapted database, I
> couldn't possibly comply.
>
> _______________________________________________
> talk mailing list
> talk at openstreetmap.org
> http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk
>
> 







More information about the talk mailing list