agree anselm. I'm tempted to go a bit further...
capitalism aside, from the beginning, the internet and worldwide web
have been fueled by a circle of gifts --- the driving engine ---
millions of people and .orgs openly sharing interfaces, code, and hacks
and data, media, web fun, science, art and now maps.. . for the world
-community to re-synthesize into something better in a continuous cycle
of goodness.
If they are not careful, google's heavy footed aggregation and sale of
user data, cold spoil the party, for an open earth web
oops.. too many mixed metaphors.
Anselm Hook wrote:
Hi, sorry to post yet again today... I usually try to like not blab
more than once or twice a week or two...
We have absolutely no right to the data of our peers unless our peers
give that right to us.
Yes of course... I tried to say that... I totally agree.
We have all the right in the world to choose to use what product
we want to.
Sure. But that aside - what will clearly happen anyway - despite our
power to make choices etcetera - is that MapMaker will accidentally
crush OSM if it undergoes wide adoption. And it is probably
accidental. This is the most likely actual future...
Note that MapMaker probably has to exist in general - it is inevitable
- and so OSM obviously can't think about competing by being unique.
But the licensing could make it possible to share the data.
There's a hydraulic despotism at work; the market gets something cheap
and then becomes dependent on that choice. The monopolist then can
steer the market and pricing...
In this case it is probably accidental... we make choices as groups
all the time that metaphorically destroy wetlands, ecosystems,
diversity, downstream dependencies... We have often a legal right to
make those choices. In the case of a digital ecosystem - what would
be the best decision that would foster the most diversity and growth?
The highest bar would be to demonstrate total integrity and commitment
to the world... why not? It's not really any hassle for them to do
so... Google is integral to the Web at this point - try use the web
without Google. It is not like they are going to have their market
position eroded by people ripping off and repurposing the
collaborative edits of the world map... So why even bother with any
moderate stance? If we were building all this for ourselves, for the
people, we'd not bother with any luke-warm diluted stance... we'd
just turn that dial as far as we could towards freedom.
I hope to be part of an open source movement that doesn't browbeat
others to join it, but offers a viable, useful and attractive
alternative that competes on merit *and* philosophy. I want to like
open source because I like open source, not because I hate the other
kind. I can live with both. I do live with both.
Anyway I'm just trying out the thesis that there may exist inalienable
data rights... seeing if it fits, if it has wrinkles. It's not really
thought out yet...
a
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