What images and maps may I use to make maps from?
Most maps have copyright restrictions. This includes images from “free beer” sites as Google Maps, and printed paper maps, even if you scanned them yourself. Commercial aerial/satellite photography is also copyrighted.
You should not use copyrighted maps in any way while editing OpenStreetMap (unless it is compatible with our license). “Using” includes tracing over the map, copying a name from the map, or pinpointing a coordinate on the map. To be on the safe side, we tend to regard all of these as a form of copying, or “creating a derived work”. Generally speaking, it’s best not to even look at copyrighted maps while you are editing OpenStreetMap.
So what can you use? Not very much, which is why we are doing all this re-surveying from scratch. However there are some Potential Datasources, in particular we have imported TIGER data for the US, AND Data for the Netherlands. We also make use of out-of-copyright maps although they are very old, and Yahoo! Aerial Imagery (which we have special permission to trace over).
