Where is the formal licensing grant or waiver for “tt_proprietary” data sources, described as a change being “<valid imagery source> supported by TomTom proprietary GPS traces" by an author, such as https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/172996204? My emphasis.
I have checked https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities/TomTom#Data_Sources, and it makes no mention of full relicensing under ODbL, or any other sort of licensing grant. In my book, rectifying against such GPS traces is not a contribution we can accept without something definite and explicit somewhere we can all see it.
I trust it’s just bad wording in the changeset, and that there’s something written down somewhere.
I’m not quite following the concern, but it’s not unlikely I’m just missing something. If I personally go out on a drive, and collect a GPS trace of that trip, and then use that trace as one my sources for contributing a change to OpenStreetMap, then I don’t need to specifically release that trace as ODbL or anything else, right? I mean, I can upload the GPS trace itself to OSM (and I usually in fact do), but I don’t think I’m required to show it to anyone else in order to use it for improving the map. I can look at it in iD or JOSM, along with known-to-be-compatible imagery, and use it as part of what I’m referencing in order to make a change. Isn’t it the same thing if it’s an organization, rather than me personally, that takes a trace and uses it to make changes?
Just the wording from a big corporation declaring that they’ve staked a proprietary claim over that source. Going out of their way to assert that in the changeset comment, twice in fact.
(I’d be much less twitchy if it stated “our data, and btw guys you can keep stuff derived from it under ODbL because <grant> <waiver> <wiki page>”)
Good enough for me if thought from all the relevant bodies has gone into it. They are engaging as a proper Organised Editing activity, after all. My pony wish is for everybody and every team to use plainer / more helpfully worded language in change comments, but you can’t have everything I guess
I can see a few easily made mistakes on that contribution, and since I live near there, I’ll get on with de-armchairing it a bit from ground truth surveys now I’m happy with the history. Thanks, all!
I mean, I see how “proprietary” can seem like a scary word when interacting with a largely-open project, but it’s really the same thing as if I had a changeset comment of “Updates based on personal photos I took of the area”, where I may have total copyright over the photos themselves, but that’s precisely what means that I do have permission to contribute to OSM based on them since I can choose what I want to do with them. Just change “personal” to “proprietary” in that hypothetical comment and it may be a bit more corporate-sounding but basically means the same thing.
If you’re looking for the official “<grant> <waiver> <wiki page>”, I think that’s the official Contributor Terms, which is the agreement any contributor is following with the changes they submit to say that OSMF can distribute those changes under the standard open terms.
Sounds good; thank you! Feel free to include text like “based on my proprietary survey of the area” in your changeset comments.
That’s a bit optimistic. While it is true that by agreeing to the CTs you make the representation that
(a) Your contribution of data should not infringe the intellectual property rights of anyone else. If you contribute Contents, You are indicating that, as far as You know, You have the right to authorize OSMF to use and distribute those Contents under our current licence terms. If You do not have that right, You risk having Your contribution deleted (see below).
but it does not mean that this is actually the case or that would negate any rights a third party has in the data. Note that this is separate from the import scenario (aka copying third party data in to the data based on special terms).
