On Sat, Oct 10, 2009 at 03:32:02PM +0100, Ian Eiloart wrote: > > 2009/10/7 Matthew Somerville <[email protected]>: > >> > >> One would assume the Ordnance Survey have taken legal advice on their > >> OpenSpace, which appears to state that point based derivation from > >> an OS > >> map would belong to the OS: > >> http://openspace.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/openspace/faq.html sections 2.1 > >> and 2.2; and > > > > 2.1 (which is the relevant one) is suitably weasely. > > > > "When you use OS OpenSpace to geocode data by adding locations or > > attributes to it that have been directly accessed from and/or made > > available by Ordnance Survey mapping data, then the resulting data is > > 'derived data', because it is derived from Ordnance Survey data." > > > > If you take a mapped feature and use OS OpenSpace to create a > > (location, attributes) tuple, you are doing two things: > > > > (i) if you do this to all such features, or very many features, you > > are doing something akin to tracing a copy of the map and adding > > additional information, that would be a derived work just as much as > > if you used a pantograph or tracing paper; > > > > (ii) the OS may have a database right in the features that they > > present, if you extract (a substantial amount) of them then you may > > infringe any database right they have in them. > > What, pray, is a "database right"?
Broadly speaking, it gives you certain rights with regards to a collection of information (e.g. a database), even if you don't own the rights to each individual piece of information. For example, if you build a web site listing pubs in the UK, you can't claim copyright on the address of each pub, but you can probably claim a database right on the database as a whole. The Intellectual Property Office has a brief outline: http://www.ipo.gov.uk/types/copy/c-otherprotect/c-databaseright.htm The University of Manchester Intellectual Property has some guides on the subject, they are naturally aimed at researchers but the "Intellectual Property and Confidentiality" PDF covers IP in general: http://www.umip.com/researchers_guides.htm Paul -- Paul Waring http://www.pwaring.com _______________________________________________ Mailing list [email protected] Archive, settings, or unsubscribe: https://secure.mysociety.org/admin/lists/mailman/listinfo/developers-public
