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On 30 May 2009, at 19:19, P Kishor <[email protected]> wrote:
On Sat, May 30, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Christopher Schmidt
<[email protected]> wrote:
On Sat, May 30, 2009 at 01:47:12PM +0200, Marc Wick wrote:
Do you think that ODbL is a suitable license for geospatial data?
Does
it meet your needs?
Definitely not. Data is either open or share-alike. It cannot be
both.
Share-alike data is NOT open. It is a serious restriction that
prevents
innovation and most interesting use cases from the beginning. It
also
makes users vulnerable to any kind of lawsuits.
Don't get me wrong. Everybody has the right to protect their data,
but
they should not call it open if they want to prevent others from
using it.
This sounds like a classic "Viral" vs "Non-viral" discussion -- the
same
one in Open Source code would be BSD vs. GPL.
Is it your reasoning that the GPL is not 'open'? If so, then your
point here seems to be contrary to the point of the discussion.
SA enforces certain restrictions -- as does "Attribution". Saying
that
a license isn't open unless a user can do whatever they want with
it --
essentially, that only Public Domain is 'open' -- seems silly and a
counterproductive point in this discussion.
First, no discussion is counterproductive (well, ok, some other, but
this discussion is certainly not yet counterproductive).
I may be misunderstanding him, but I don't think Marc suggested that
_only_ PD is 'open.' I certainly don't think that only PD is 'open.'
Of course, everyone is free to license their data under whatever
license their jurisdiction allows them to license it under, and
whatever makes sense to them. However, in the context of scientific
data, I do believe that SA's viral-ness can create problems. Data, in
my view, are the non-IP building blocks of IP. By making data
available under a PD-like data mark, unrestricted innovation is made
possible.
My view is -- think of what is served by the license you are about to
apply. Do you gain anything? If you collect a few GPS points, what do
you gain by licensing it under BY or SA or ND or NC? Are you going to
become rich? famous? Are you going to ensure future innovation?
I certainly don't believe that I will become rich or famous by
licensing my data under a license that actually ends up throttling
innovation even remotely. By putting my data out in a PD-like mark, I
actually ensure that my data remains permanently open. In fact, PD is
the most concrete assurance of forever-openness. Sure, someone else
can take my data, add value to it, and make that value-added version
restricted. So what? In fact, I believe that is a good thing, and
because my data are in PD, everyone else in this world has the same
opportunity.
Stop taking the high ground. CC didn't succeed by lecturing us all
that things 'should' be PD.
Anyway, getting back to SC's position on geospatial data... hopefully
SC will have an explicit position on geospatial data that will make
everyone happy and also promote the cause of forever free and open
access.
I just don't get it, why do they need a position at all? Have I missed
something? I want license options like SA and NC and BY, not their
'position'.
Did CC spend years on a 'position' before letting us have the licenses?
Really start listening, we are all not going PD just because you guys
think it's best.
I don't speak for SC, but I do have a fairly good connection
to SC in helping realize that vision, and I believe discussions like
these will help.
--
Christopher Schmidt
MetaCarta
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--
Puneet Kishor http://www.punkish.org/
Carbon Model http://carbonmodel.org/
Charter Member, Open Source Geospatial Foundation http://
www.osgeo.org/
Science Commons Fellow, Geospatial Data http://sciencecommons.org
Nelson Institute, UW-Madison http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/
---
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